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A BIOGRAPHICAL  AW)  BBBEIOGRAPHXCAI, 

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DANIEL  WEBSTER . 
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Specially  engraved  for  the  Ridpatk  Library. 

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’FIFTH  AVENUE  LIBRARY  SOCIETY 
NEW  YORK 


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A Biographical  and  Bibliographical 
Summary  op  the;  World’s  Most  Bmp- 
nent  Authors,  including  the 
Choicest  Extracts  and  Master* 
pieces  from  their  Writings  **» 


Carefully  Revised  and  Arranoeb  by  a 
Corps  of  the  Most  Capable  Sgb. olars 


EDITOR-IN-CHIEF 


John  Clark  Ridpatft,  AM.,  LL.D. 

Editor  of 44  The  Arena,”  Author  of 41  Ridpath'# 
History  of  the  United  States,”  44  Encyclo- 
pedia of  Universal  History,”  “ Great 
Races  of  Mankind,”  etc.,  etc. 


JBbttlon  t>c  X«ue 

TWENTY-FIVE  VOLUMES 

Yol.  XXIV. 


FIFTH  AVENUE  LIBRARY  SOCIETY 


NEW  YORK 


Copyright,  1899 

By  THE  GLOBE  PUBLISHING  COMPANY 


5 08.5 

^f/\t 

0 

KEY  TO  PRONUNCIATION. 


a as  in  fat,  man,  pang, 
a as  in  fate,  mane,  dale, 
a as  in  far,  father,  guard. 

3 as  in  fall,  talk, 
a as  in  ask,  fast,  ant. 
a as  in  fare, 
e as  in  met,  pen,  bless, 
e as  in  mete,  meet, 
e as  in  her,  fern, 
i as  in  pin,  it. 

i as  in  pine,  fight,  file, 
o as  in  not,  on,  frog. 

o as  in  note,  poke,  floor. 

0 as  in  move,  spoon. 

6 as  in  nor,  song,  off. 
u as  in  tub. 

u as  in  mute,  acute, 
u as  in  pull. 

ii  German  iS,  French  u. 

01  as  in  oil,  joint,  boy. 
ou  as  in  pound,  proud. 

A single  dot  under  a vowel  in  an 
unaccented  syllable  indicates  its  ab- 
breviation and  lightening,  without  ab- 
solute loss  of  its  distinctive  quality. 
Thus : 

3 as  in  prelate,  courage. 

5 as  in  ablegate,  episcopal. 

9 as  in  abrogate,  eulogy,  democrat 
9 as  in  singular,  education. 

A double  dot  under  a vowel  in  an  un- 
accented syllable  indicates  that,  even  in 
the  mouths  of  the  best  speakers,  its 


sound  is  variable  to,  and  in  ordinary  ut- 
terance actually  becomes,  the  short  u- 
sound  (of  but,  pun,  etc.).  Thus: 
a as  in  errant,  republican, 
e as  in  prudent,  difference, 
i as  in  charity,  density, 
o as  in  valor,  actor,  idiot 
g as  in  Persia,  peninsula, 
e as  in  the  book. 

Q as  in  nature,  feature. 

A mark  (^)under  the  consonants  t,  dy 
s,  z indicates  that  they  in  like  manner 
are  variable  to  ch,  j,  sh,  zh.  Thus : 

J as  in  nature,  adventure, 
d as  in  arduous,  education, 
s as  in  pressure, 
z as  in  seizure, 
y as  in  yet. 

B Spanish  b (medial). 

ch  as  in  German  ach,  Scotch  loch. 

G as  in  German  Abensberg,  Hamburg. 
H Spanish  g before  e and  i;  Spanish  j ; 
etc.  (a  guttural  h). 

ri  French  nasalizing  n,  as  in  ton,  en. 
s final  s in  Portuguese  (soft), 
th  as  in  thin. 

YH  as  in  then. 

D »TH. 

' denotes  a primary,  " a aecandary  ac- 
cent. (A  secondary  accent  is  not  marked 
if  at  its  regular  interval  of  two  syllable* 
from  the  primary,  or  from  another  sec- 
ondary.) 


LIST  OF  AUTHORS,  VOL.  XXIV, 


(WITH  PRONUNCIATION.) 


Warburton  (war'ber  ton),  Eliot  Barthol- 
omew George. 

Warburton,  William. 

Ward  (ward),  Artemus.  See  Browne, 
Charles  Farrar. 

Ward,  Elizabeth  Stuart  (Phelps). 

Ward,  Mrs.  Humphry. 

Ward,  Nathaniel. 

Ware  (war),  William. 

Warner  (wdr'ner),  Charles  Dudley. 
Warner,  Susan  and  Anna. 

Warren  (wor'en),  Samuel. 

Warton  (wSr'ton),  Joseph. 

Warton,  Thomas. 

Washington  (wosh'ing  ton),  George. 
Wasson  (wos'on),  David  Atwood. 
Waters  (wfi'terz),  Clara  Erskine  (Clem- 
ent). 

Watson  (wot'son),  Henry  Clay. 

Watson,  Rev.  John. 

Watson,  William. 

Watterson  (wot'er  son),  Henry. 

Watts  (wots),  Anna  Mary.  See  Howitt, 
Anna  Mary. 

Watts,  Isaac. 

Wayland  (wa'land),  Francis. 

Webb  (web),  Charles  Henry. 

Webster  (web'ster),  Daniel. 

Webster,  John. 

Webster,  Noah. 

Welhaven  (vel'ha-ven),  Johan  Sebas- 
tian Cammermeyer. 

Wells  (welz),  David  Ames. 

Wells,  H.  G. 

Wergeland  (ver'ge-l&nd),  Henrik  Ar- 
nold. 

Werner  (ver'ner),  Friedrich  Ludwig 
Zacharias. 

Wesley  (wesTi  or  wes'li),  Charles. 
Wesley,  John. 


Wessel  (ves'sel),  Johan  Hermann. 
Wetherell  (weTH'er  el),  Elizabeth.  See 
Warner,  Susan. 

Weyman  (wi'man),  Stanley  J. 

Whately  (hwat'li),  Richard. 

Whewell  (hii'el),  William. 

Whipple  (hwip/l),  Edwin  Percy. 
Whitcher  (hwitch'er),  Frances  Miriam, 
White  (hwit),  Gilbert. 

White,  Henry  Kirke. 

White,  Richard  Grant. 

Whitefield  (hwit'feld),  George. 

Whitman  (hwit'man),  Sarah  Helen. 
Whitman,  Walt.  ’ 

Whitney  (hwit'ni),  Adeline  Duttoa 
Train. 

Whitney,  William  Dwight. 

Whittier  (hwit'i  er),  John  Greenleaf. 
Whymper  (hwim'per),  Edward. 

Wiclif  (wik'lif),  John  de. 

Widow  Bedott  (be  dot').  See  Whitcher 
Frances  Miriam. 

Wieland  (we'land;  Ger.  pron.,  vS'lant), 
Christoph  Martin. 

Wilberforce  (wilder  fors),  Samuel. 
Wilcox  (wil'koks),  Ella  (Wheeler). 
Wilkinson  (wiFkin  son),  Sir  John  Gard- 
ner. 

Wilkinson,  William  Cleaver. 

Willard  (wil'ard),  Emma  Hart 
Willard,  Frances  Elizabeth. 

Williams  (wil'yamz),  Roger. 

Williams,  Samuel  Wells. 

Willis  (wil'is),  Nathaniel  Parker. 

Willson  (wil'son)  Byron  Forcaytbe, 
Wilson  (wil'son),  Alexander. 

Wilson,  Augusta  J.  Evan*. 

Wilson,  James  Grant 
Wilson,  John. 

Wilson,  Tbemac  Waodrew. 


LIST  OF  AUTHORS,  VOL.  XXIV. 


Winchell  (win'chel),  Alexander. 

Winslow  (winz'lo),  Edward. 

Winsor  (win'zor),  Justin. 

Winter  (win'ter),  William. 

Winthrop  (win'throp),  John. 

Winthrop,  Robert  Charles. 

Winthrop,  Theodore. 

Wirt  (wert),  William. 

Wiseman  (wiz'man),  Nicholas. 

Wolcot  (wiil'kot),  John. 

Wolfe  (wulf),  Charles. 

Wood  (wud),  Ellen  (Price). 

Wood,  Mrs.  Henry.  See  Wood,  Ellen 
Price. 

Woodworth  (wud'wferth),  Samuel. 
Woolsey  (wiil'si),  Sarah  Chauncey. 
Woolsey,  Theodore  Dwight 
Woolson  (wul'spn),  Constance  Feni- 
more. 

Wordsworth  (w6rdz'w6rth),  William. 


Work  (werk),  Henry  Clay. 

Wotton  (wot'pn),  Sir  Henry. 

Wyatt  (wi'at),  Sir  Thomas. 

Wyclif  (wik'lif),  John.  See  Wiclif, 
John. 

Wyes  (vis),  Johann  Rudolph. 

Xenophon  (zen'o  fon). 

Yates  (yats),  Edmund  Hodgson. 

Yonge,  Charlotte  Mary. 

Young,  Edward. 

Zangwill  (zang'wil),  IsraeL 
Zola  (zS'la),  Emile. 

Zoroaster  (zo  ro  as'ter). 

Zorrilla,  y Moral  (thor-rgl'yS  6 mo-rSl'), 

Jose. 

Zschokke  (tshok'ke),  Johann  Heinrich 
Daniel. 

Zwingli  (z wing^f),  Ulric. 


WARBURTON,  Eliot  Bartholomew 
George,  an  Irish  writer  of  travels,  memoirs,  and 
novels,  was  born  near  Tuilamore,  Ireland,  in  1810; 
died  at  sea,  January  4,  1852.  He  was  educated  at 
Queen’s  College,  and  at  Trinity,  Cambridge,  and 
became  a member  of  the  Irish  bar,  but  gave  up 
law  for  travel  and  literature.  His  book  The  Cres- 
cent and  the  Cross  (1844),  first  published  as  Episodes 
of  Eastern  Travel  in  the  Dublin  University  Mag- 
azine, made  him  widely  known  as  a sparkling 
writer.  Following  this,  he  published  Hochelaga , 
or  England  in  the  New  World  (American  edition, 
1846),  the  title  being  the  ancient  name  of  Canada, 
but  Part  II.  pertaining  to  the  United  States; 
Memoirs  of  Prince  Rupert  and  the  Cavaliers  (1849); 
Darien , or  the  Merchant  Prince , and  Memoirs 
Horace  Walpole  and  His  Contemporaries  (1851)  ; also 
Reginald  Hastings , a Tale  of  164.0-50.  The  author 
perished  in  the  destruction  of  the  West  Indian 
mail-steamer  Amazon , lost  off  Land’s  End.  In 
Hochelaga  there  is  a sketch  of  the  rebellions  and 
invasions  of  Canada  in  1837-38. 

Of  his  Memoirs  of  Prince  Rupert  and  the  Cavaliers , 
the  Athenceum  says:  “The  story  of  the  Cavaliers 
is  told  in  these  volumes  with  much  spirit — -we 
wish  we  could  add,  with  impartiality.” 

His  Crescent  and  the  Cross , parts  of  which  were 
first  published  in  the  Dublin  University  Magazine , 

(7) 


ELIOT  BARTHOLOMEW  GEORGE  WARBURTON 


under  the  title  Episodes  of  Eastern  Travel , attracted 
wide-spread  attention,  and  received  praise  from  the 
highest  literary  authorities,  Sir  Archibald  Allison 
saying  that  the  descriptions  rivalled  those  of 
William  Beckford  and  that  they  were  indelibly 
engraven  on  the  national  mind. 

MOOSE-HUNTING. 

We  pressed  on  rapidly  over  the  brow  of  the  hill,  in  the 
direction  of  the  dogs,  and  came  upon  the  fresh  track  of 
several  moose.  In  my  eagerness  to  get  forward,  I 
stumbled  repeatedly,  tripped  by  the  abominable  snow- 
shoes,  and  had  great  difficulty  in  keeping  up  with  the 
Indians,  who,  though  also  violently  excited,  went  on 
quite  at  their  ease.  The  dogs  were  at  a standstill,  and, 
as  we  emerged  from  the  thick  part  of  the  wood,  we  saw 
them  surrounding  three  large  moose,  barking  viciously, 
but  not  daring  to  approach  within  reach  of  their  hoofs 
or  antlers.  When  the  deer  saw  us,  they  bolted  away, 
plunging  heavily  through  the  deep  snow,  slowly  and  with 
great  difficulty  ; at  every  step  sinking  to  the  shoulder, 
the  curs  at  their  heels  as  near  as  they  could  venture. 
They  all  broke  in  different  directions  ; the  captain  pur- 
sued one,  I another,  and  one  of  the  Indians  the  third  ; 
at  first  they  beat  us  in  speed  ; for  a few  hundred  yards 
mine  kept  stoutly  on,  but  his  track  became  wider  and 
more  irregular,  and  large  drops  of  blood  on  the  pure, 
fresh  snow  showed  that  the  poor  animal  was  wounded 
by  the  hard,  icy  crust  of  the  old  fall.  We  were  pressing 
down  the  hill  through  very  thick  “bush”  and  could  not 
see  him,  but  his  panting  and  crashing  through  the  under- 
wood were  plainly  heard.  On,  on,  the  branches  smash 
and  rattle,  but  just  ahead  of  us  the  panting  is  louder 
and  closer,  the  track  red  with  blood  ; the  hungry  dogs 
howl  and  yell  almost  under  our  feet.  On,  on,  through 
the  deep  snow,  among  rugged  rocks  and  the  tall  pines, 
we  hasten,  breathless  and  eager.  Swinging  around  a 
close  thicket,  we  open  in  a swampy  valley  with  a few 
patriarchal  trees  rising  from  it,  bare  of  branches  to  a 
hundred  feet  in  height ; in  the  centre  stands  the  moose. 


ELIOT  BARTHOLOMEW  GEORGE  WAR  BURT  OH  9 

facing  us  ; his  failing  knees  refuse  to  carry  him  any 
further  through  the  choking  drifts ; the  dogs  press 
upon  him  ; whenever  his  proud  head  turns,  they  fly 
away  yelling  with  terror,  but  with  grinning  teeth  and 
hungry  eyes  rush  at  him  from  behind. 

He  was  a noble  brute,  standing  at  least  seven  feet 
high  ; his  large,  dark  eye  was  fixed,  I fancied  almost 
imploringly,  upon  me  as  I approached.  He  made  no 
further  effort  to  escape,  or  resist ; I fired,  and  the  ball 
struck  him  in  the  chest.  The  wound  roused  him ; in- 
furiated by  the  pain,  he  raised  his  huge  bulk  out  of  the 
snow,  and  plunged  toward  me.  I fired  the  second  bar- 
rel; he  stopped,  and  staggered,  stretched  out  his  neck, 
and  blood  gushed  in  a stream  from  his  mouth,  his 
tongue  protruded,  then  slowly,  as  if  lying  down  to  rest, 
he  fell  over  in  the  snow.  The  dogs  would  not  yet  touch 
him  ; nor  would  even  the  Indians  ; they  said  that  this 
was  the  most  dangerous  time — he  might  struggle  yet ; 
so  we  watched  cautiously  till  the  large,  dark  eye  grew 
dim  and  glazed,  and  the  sinewy  limbs  were  stiffened 
out  in  death  ; then  we  approached  and  stood  over  our 
fallen  foe. 

When  the  excitement  which  had  touched  the  savage 
chord  of  love  of  destruction,  to  be  found  in  every  nat- 
ure, was  over,  I felt  ashamed,  guilty,  self-condemned, 
like  a murderer  ; the  snow  defiled  with  the  red  stain  ; 
the  meek  eye,  a few  moments  before  bright  with  healthy 
life,  now  a mere  filmy  ball ; the  vile  dogs,  that  had  not 
dared  to  touch  him  while  alive,  licked  up  the  stream  of 
blood,  and  fastened  on  his  heels.  I was  thoroughly 
disgusted  with  myself  and  the  tame  and  cruel  sport. 

The  Indians  knocked  down  a decayed  tree,  rubbed 
up  some  dry  bark  in  their  hands,  applied  a match  to  it, 
and  in  a few  moments  made  a splendid  fire  close  by  the 
dead  moose;  a small  space  was  trampled  down,  the 
saplings  laid  as  usual,  for  a seat,  from  whence  I inspected 
the  skinning  and  cutting  up  of  the  carcass ; a part  of 
the  proceeding  which  occupied  nearly  two  hours.  The 
hide  and  the  most  valuable  parts  were  packed  on  the 
toboggans,  and  the  remnant  of  the  noble  brute  was  left 
for  the  wolves  ; then  we  returned  to  the  cabin. — Hoche - 
laga . 


WARBURTON,  William,  an  English  criticand 
theologian,  Bishop  of  Gloucester,  born  at  Newark, 
December  24,  1698;  died  at  Gloucester,  June  7, 
1779.  He  was  the  son  of  an  attorney  at  Newark, 
and  adopted  his  father’s  profession,  but  forsook  it 
for  the  clerical,  becoming  rector  of  Brand  Brough- 
ton, Lincolnshire,  and  rising  by  preferments  to 
the  office  of  bishop.  In  his  time,  he  was  regard- 
ed as  a formidable  defender  of  the  faith ; but  his 
great  learning  and  force  were  not  always  wisely 
employed,  and  his  works  have  fallen  into  oblivion. 
Among  these  were  The  Alliance  between  Church 
and  State  (1723),  a defence  of  the  same;  The  Di- 
vine Legation  of  Moses  (1738-41),  a ponderous  work 
of  learning,  assuming  and  defending  an  omission 
of  immortality  in  the  Old  Testament,  in  reply  to 
deists;  Remarks  on  Rutherfortli  s Essay  on  Virtue 
(1747);  a defence  of  Pope’s  Essay  on  Man , The 
Principles  of  Natural  and  Revealed  Religion , and  a 
View  of  Bolingbroke' s Philosophy  (1755);  a review 
of  Hume’s  Natural  History  of  Religion,  and  an  edi- 
tion of  Shakespeare  with  comments.  Pope  be- 
queathed to  him  the  copyright  of  his  poems  and 
other  works,  valued  at  £4,000.  A volume  of  the 
bishop’s  letters  was  published  anonymously  by 
Bishop  Hurd  (American  edition,  1809),  entitled 
Letters  from  a Prelate . 

“ His  Divine  Legation  of  Moses,"  says  Lord  Jef- 

(10) 


WILLIAM  WAR  BUR  TO  AT 


II 


fry,  in  the  Edinburgh  Review , “ is  the  most  learned, 
most  arrogant,  and  most  absurd  work  which  has 
been  produced  in  England  for  a century. 

“ The  Divine  Legation  of  Moses  f says  Edward 
Gibbon,  “ is  a monument,  already  crumbling  into 
dust,  of  the  vigor  and  the  weakness  of  the  human 
mind.  If  Warburton’s  new  argument  proved  any- 
thing, it  would  be  a demonstration  against  the 
legislator  who  left  his  people  without  the  knowl- 
edge of  a future  state.  But  some  episodes  of  the 
work — on  the  Greek  philosophy,  the  hieroglyphics 
of  Egypt,  etc. — are  entitled  to  the  praise  of  learn- 
ing, imagination,  and  discernment.” 

“ Of  all  Warburton’s  works,  The  Doctrine  of 
Grace”  says  Rev.  T.  D.  Whitaker,  “ is  that  which 
does  least  honor  to  his  heart,  and  perhaps,  though 
written  with  all  his  native  spirit,  to  his  head.” 

“Mr.  Warburton  is  the  greatest  general  critic 
I ever  knew,”  says  Alexander  Pope  ; “ the  most 
capable  of  seeing  through  all  the  possibilities  of 
things.” 

“ His  style  is  copious  without  selection,”  says  Dr. 
Johnson,  “ and  forcible  without  neatness;  he  took 
the  words  that  presented  themselves ; his  diction 
is  coarse  and  impure,  and  his  sentences  are  un- 
measured.” 

IS  LUXURY  A PUBLIC  BENEFIT  ? 

To  the  lasting  opprobrium  of  our  age  and  country, 
we  have  seen  a writer  publicly  maintain,  in  a book  so 
entitled,  that  private  vices  were  public  be?ieftts.  . . . 

In  his  proof  of  it,  he  all  along  explains  it  by  vice  only 
in  a certain  measure,  and  to  a certain  degree.  . . . 

The  author,  descending  to  the  enumeration  of  his  proofs, 
appears  plainly  to  have  seen  that  vice  in  general  was 


12 


WILLIAM  WARBURTOtf 


only  accidentally  productive  of  good  : and  theretorc 
avoids  entering  into  an  examination  of  particulars  ; but 
selects,  out  of  his  favorite  tribe,  luxury , to  support  his 
execrable  paradox  ; and  on  this  alone  rests  his  cause. 
By  the  assistance  of  this  ambiguous  term,  he  keeps 
something  like  an  argument  on  foot,  even  after  he  hath 
left  all  the  rest  of  his  city-crew  to  shift  for  them- 
selves. . . . 

First,  in  order  to  perplex  and  obscure  our  idea  of  lux- 
ury, he  hath  labored,  in  a previous  dissertation,  on  the 
origin  of  moral  virtue,  to  destroy  those  very  principles, 
by  whose  assistance  we  are  only  able  to  clear  up  and 
ascertain  that  idea  : where  he  decries  and  ridicules  the 
essential  difference  of  things,  the  eternal  notions  of 
right  and  wrong  ; and  makes  virtue,  which  common 
moralists  deduce  from  thence,  the  offspring  of  craft  and 
pride. 

Nothing  now  being  left  to  fix  the  idea  of  luxury  but 
the  positive  precepts  of  Christianity,  and  he  having 
stript  these  of  their  only  true  and  infallible  interpreter, 
the  principles  of  natural  religion,  it  was  easy  for  him  to 
make  those  precepts  speak  in  favor  of  any  absurdities 
that  would  serve  his  purpose,  and  as  easy  to  find  such 
absurdities  supported  by  the  superstition  and  fanaticism 
of  some  or  other  of  those  many  sects  and  parties  of 
Christianity,  who,  despising  the  principles  of  the  relig- 
ion of  Nature  as  the  weak  and  beggarly  elements, 
soon  came  to  regard  the  natural  appetites  as  the  grace- 
less furniture  of  the  old  man,  with  his  affections  and 
lusts. 

Having  got  Christianity  at  this  advantage,  he  gives 
us  for  Gospel  that  meagre  phantom  begot  by  the  hy- 
pocrisy of  monks  on  the  misanthropy  of  ascetics : 
which  cries  out,  An  abuse  ! whenever  the  gifts  of  Provi- 
dence are  used  further  than  for  the  bare  support  of 
nature.  So  that  by  this  rule  everything  becomes  lux- 
ury which  is  more  than  necessary.  An  idea  of  luxury 
exactly  fitted  to  our  author’s  hypothesis  : for  if  no  state 
can  be  rich  and  powerful  while  its  members  seek  only  a 
bare  subsistence,  and,  if  what  is  more  than  a bare  sub- 
sistence be  luxury,  and  luxury  be  vice,  the  conse- 
quence, we  see,  comes  in  pat — private  vices  are  publ*^ 


WILLIAM  WARBURTON 


*3 


benefits.  Here  you  have  the  sole  issue  of  all  this  tumor 
of  words.  . . . 

But  the  Gospel  is  a very  different  thing  from  what 
bigots  and  fanatics  are  wont  to  represent  it.  It  enjoins 
and  forbids  nothing  in  moral  practice  but  what  natural 
religion  had  before  enjoined  and  forbid.  Neither  could 
it,  because  one  of  God’s  revelations,  whether  ordinary 
or  extraordinary,  cannot  contradict  another ; and  be- 
cause God  gave  us  the  first,  to  judge  the  others  by 
it.  . . . 

The  religion  of  nature,  then,  being  restored,  and  made 
the  rule  to  explain  and  interpret  the  occasional  precepts 
of  Christianity  ; what  is  luxury  by  natural  religion,  that, 
and  that  only,  must  be  luxury  by  revealed.  So  a true 
and  precise  definition  of  it,  which  this  writer  (triumph- 
ing in  the  obscurity  which,  by  these  arts,  he  hath  thrown 
over  the  idea)  thinks  it  impossible  to  give,  so  as  not  to 
suit  with  his  hypothesis,  is  easily  settled.  Luxury  is 
the  using  of  the  gifts  of  Providence  to  the  injury  of  the 
user,  either  in  his  person  or  his  fortune  ; or  to  the  in- 
jury of  any  other,  toward  whom  the  user  stands  in  any 
relation,  which  obliges  him  to  aid  and  assist. 

Now  it  is  evident,  even  from  the  instances  this  writer 
brings  of  the  public  advantages  of  consumption,  which 
he  indiscriminately,  and  therefore  falsely,  calls  luxury, 
that  the  utmost  consumption  may  be  made,  and  so  all 
the  ends  of  a rich  and  powerful  Society  served,  and 
without  injury  to  the  user,  or  anyone,  to  whom  he 
stands  related  : consequently  without  luxury,  and  with- 
out vice.  When  the  consumption  is  attended  with  such 
injury,  then  it  becomes  luxury,  then  it  becomes  vice. 
But  then  let  us  take  notice  that  this  vice,  like  all  others, 
is  so  far  from  being  advantageous  to  Society,  that  it  is 
the  most  certain  ruin  of  it.  It  was  this  luxury  which 
destroyed  Rome. — The  Divine  Legation  of  Moses , Vol.  /., 
Book  i. 


WARD,  Elizabeth  Stuart  (Phelps),  an 
American  novelist,  born  at  Andover,  Mass.,  Au- 
gust 13,  1844.  Her  grandfather,  Moses  Stuart, 
and  her  father,  Austin  Phelps,  were  professors  in 
the  Theological  Seminary  at  Andover,  and  both 
contributed  largely  to  religious  literature.  Her 
mother,  likewise  Elizabeth  Stuart  Phelps  (1815- 
52),  wrote  several  popular  books,  among  which  is 
Sunny  Side  (1851).  The  daughter  commenced 
writing  at  an  early  age.  Her  works— some  of 
which  had  already  appeared  in  periodicals,  are : 
Ellen  s Idol  (1864) ; Up  Hill  (1865) ; Mercy  Gliddon's 
Work  ( 1 866) ; Tiny  Stories  (4  vols.,  1866-69);  Gipsy 
Stories  (4  vols.,  1866-69);  The  Gates  Ajar  (1868); 
Men,  Women , and  Ghosts  (1869);  The  Silent  Partner 
(1870);  Trotty's  Wedding  Tour  (1873);  The  Good- 
Aim  Series  (1874) ; Poetic  Studies  (1875)  ; The  Story 
of  Avis  (1 877)  ; My  Cousin  and  I (1879)  J Old  Maid's 
Paradise  (1879)  » Sealed  Orders  (1879);  Friends,  a 
Duet  { 1881);  Beyond  the  Gates  (1883)  ; Songs  of  the 
Silent  World  (1884);  Dr.  Zay  (1884);  Burglars  in 
Paradise  (1886) ; The  Gates  Between  (1887)  I Jack  the 
Fisherman  (1887);  The  Struggle  for  Immortality 
(1889)  ; Memoirs  of  Austin  Phelps,  her  father  (1891) ; 
Donald  Marcy  (1893);  Hedged  In;  The  Supply  at 
Saint  Agatha's ; A Singular  Life  (1896),  and  The 
Life  of  Christ  (1897).  In  1888  Miss  Phelps  married 

U4) 


ELIZABETH  STUART  WARD 


15 


Mr.  Herbert  D.  Ward.  They  have  published  two 
novels  in  collaboration,  The  Master  of  the  Magicians 
and  Come  Forth  (1890). 

Reviewing  Mrs.  Ward’s  recent  books  A Singu- 
lar Life  and  The  Supply  at  Saint  Agatha  s , a writer 
in  the  Bookman  says  : “ I believe  it  is  George  Eliot 
who  said  that  the  success  of  a woman  novelist  lies 
in  her  ability  to  feel  and  write  like  a woman,  in 
emancipation  from  the  masculine  literary  influ- 
ence. Miss  Phelps  is  forever  the  woman,  and  I 
suppose  that  is  why  she  gives  us  the  novel  of 
emotion  rather  than  the  novel  of  manners  or  so- 
ciological report,  and  that  her  highest  gift  of  pas- 
sion is  spiritual.  And  as  emotion  is  a subordinate 
quality,  at  any  rate  with  the  present  American 
novel  of  repute,  we  feel  grateful  that  an  author  of 
quite  subtle  intellectual  power  does  not  rest  her 
success  onintellectualism.  Miss  Phelps’s  technique 
goes  without  saying;  it  has  the  power  of  an  in- 
spired rather  than  a studied  effect.  Perhaps  that 
is  because  the  great  emotion — the  chief  end  of  her 
book — is  always  what  she  is  feeling  most  deeply. 
From  this  results  a certain  unconsciousness  on  her 
part  as  to  literary  ways  and  means,  which  in  turn 
diverts  the  reader  from  an  appreciation  of  tech- 
nicalities in  her  work.  He  feels  himself  subject, 
first  and  last,  to  the  emotional  appeal.” 

THE  “hands”  AT  HAYLE  AND  KELSO’S. 

If  you  are  one  of  the  “ hands  ” in  the  Hayle  and 
Kelso  Mills,  you  go  to  your  work,  as  is  well  known, 
from  the  hour  of  half-past  six  to  seven,  according  to 
the  turn  of  the  season.  Time  has  been  when  you  went 


16 


&LI2ABETH  STUART  WARD 


at  half-past  four.  The  Senior  forgot  this  the  other  day 
in  a little  talk  which  he  had  with  his  Silent  Partner : 
very  naturally,  the  time  having  been  so  long  past.  But 
the  time  has  been,  is  now  yet,  in  places.  Mr.  Hayle  can 
tell  you  of  mills  he  saw  in  New  Hampshire,  where  they 
ring  them  up,  winter  and  summer,  in  and  out,  at  half-past 
four  in  the  morning.  Oh,  no,  never  let  out  before  six 
as  a matter  of  course.  Mr.  Hayle  disapproves  of  this  ; 
Mr.  Hayle  thinks  it  not  human  ; Mr.  Hayle  is  confident 
that  you  would  find  no  mission  Sunday-school  connect- 
ed with  that  concern. 

If  you  are  one  of  the  “hands,”  you  are  so  dully  used 
to  this  classification  that  you  were  never  known  to  cul- 
tivate an  objection  to  it,  are  scarcely  found  to  notice 
either  its  use  or  disuse  : being  neither  head  nor  heart, 
what  else  remains  ? Scarcely  conscious  from  bell  to  bell, 
from  sleep  to  sleep,  from  day  to  dark,  of  either  head  or 
heart,  there  seems  a singular  appropriateness  of  the 
word  with  which  you  are  dimly  struck.  Hayle  and 
Kelso  label  you.  There  you  are.  The  world  thinks, 
aspires,  creates,  enjoys.  There  you  are.  You  are  the 
fingers  of  the  world.  You  take  your  patient  place.  The 
world  may  have  read  of  you  ; but  only  that  it  may 
think,  aspire,  create,  enjoy.  It  needs  your  patience  as 
well  as  your  place.  You  take  both,  and  the  world  is 
used  to  both  ; and  so,  having  put  the  label  on  for 
safety’s  sake,  lest  you  should  be  mistaken  for  a thinking, 
aspiring,  creating,  enjoying  compound,  and  so  someone 
be  poisoned,  shoves  you  into  your  place  upon  its  shelf, 
and  shuts  its  cupboard  door  upon  you. 

If  you  are  one  of  the  “hands,”  then,  in  Hayle  and 
Kelsos,  you  have  a breakfast  of  bread  and  molasses 
probably  ; you  are  apt  to  eat  it  while  you  dress.  Some- 
body is  heating  the  kettle,  but  you  cannot  wait  for  it. 
Somebody  tells  you  that  you  have  forgotten  your  shawl ; 
you  throw  it  over  one  shoulder  and  step  out,  before  it  is 
fastened,  into  the  sudden  raw  air.  You  left  lamplight 
indoors,  you  find  moonlight  without.  The  night  seems 
to  have  overslept  itself  ; you  have  a fancy  for  trying  to 
wake  it — would  like  to  shout  at  it  or  cry  through  it,  but 
feel  very  cold,  and  leave  that  for  the  bells  to  do  by  and 
by.  You  and  the  bells  are  the  only  waking  things  in 


ELIZABETH  STUART  WARD 


17 


life.  The  great  brain  of  the  world  is  in  serene  repose ; 
the  great  heart  of  the  world  lies  warm  to  the  core  with 
dreams  ; the  great  hands  of  the  world,  the  patient,  the 
perplexed — one  almost  fancies  at  times,  just  for  fancy 
— seeing  you  here  by  the  morning  moon,  the  dangerous 
hands  alone  are  stirring  in  the  dark. 

You  hang  up  your  shawl  and  your  crinoline,  and 
understand,  as  you  go  shivering  by  gaslight  to  your 
looms,  that  you  are  chilled  to  the  heart,  and  that  you 
were  careless  about  your  shawl,  but  do  not  consider 
carefulness  worth  your  while,  by  nature  or  by  habit ; a 
little  less  shawl  means  a few  less  winters  in  which  to 
require  shawling.  You  are  a godless  little  creature, 
but  you  cherish  a stolid  leaning,  in  those  morning  moons, 
toward  making  an  experiment  of  death  and  a wadded 
coffin. 

By  the  time  the  gas  is  out,  you  cease  perhaps — though 
you  cannot  depend  upon  that — to  shiver,  and  incline 
less  and  less  to  the  wadded  coffin,  and  more  to  a chat 
with  your  neighbor  in  the  alley.  Your  neighbor  is  of 
either  sex  and  any  description,  as  the  case  may  be.  In 
any  event — warming  a little  with  the  warming  day — you 
incline  more  and  more  to  chat. 

If  you  chance  to  be  a cotton-weaver,  you  are  presently 
warm  enough.  It  is  quite  warm  enough  in  the  weaving- 
room.  The  engines  respire  into  the  weaving-room  ; 
with  every  throb  of  their  huge  lungs  you  swallow  their 
breath.  The  weaving-room  stifles  with  steam.  The  win- 
dow-sills are  guttered  to  prevent  the  condensed  steam 
from  running  in  streams  along  the  floor ; sometimes 
they  overflow,  and  the  water  stands  under  the  looms. 
The  walls  perspire  profusely  ; on  a damp  day  drops  will 
fall  from  the  roof.  The  windows  of  the  weaving-room 
are  closed.  They  must  be  closed  ; a stir  in  the  air  will 
break  your  threads.  There  is  no  air  to  stir  ; you  inhale 
for  a substitute  a motionless,  hot  moisture.  If  you 
chance  to  be  a cotton-weaver  it  is  not  in  March  that 
you  think  most  about  your  coffin. 

Being  a “ hand  ” in  Hayle  and  Kelso's,  you  are  used  to 
eating  cold  luncheon  in  the  cold  at  noon ; or  you  walk, 
for  the  sake  of  a cup  of  soup  or  coffee,  half  a mile, 
three-quarters,  a mile  and  a half,  and  back.  You  am 


i8 


ELIZABETH  STUART  WARD 


allowed  three-quarters  of  an  hour  to  do  this.  You  go 
and  come  upon  the  jog-trot. 

You  grow  moody,  being  a “ hand  ” at  Hayle  and  Kel- 
so’s, with  the  declining  day,  are  inclined  to  quarrel  or 
to  confidence  with  your  neighbor  in  the  alley  ; find  the 
overseer  out  of  temper,  and  the  cotton  full  of  flaws  ; 
find  pains  in  your  feet,  your  back,  your  eyes,  your  arms  ; 
feel  damp  and  sticky  lint  in  your  hair,  your  neck,  your 
ears,  your  throat,  your  lungs  ; discover  a monotony  in 
the  process  of  breathing  hot  moisture.  You  lower  your 
window  at  your  risk  ; are  bidden  by  somebody  whose 
threads  you  have  broken  to  put  it  up  ; and  put  it  up. 
You  are  conscious  that  your  head  swims,  your  eyeballs 
burn,  your  breath  quickens.  You  yield  your  preference 
for  a wadded  coffin,  and  consider  whether  the  river 
would  not  be  the  comfortable  thing.  You  cough  a little, 
cough  a great  deal  ; lose  your  balance  in  a coughing-fit, 
snap  a thread,  and  take  to  swearing  roundly. 

From  swearing  you  take  to  singing  ; both,  perhaps, 
are  equal  relief — active  and  diverting.  There  is  some- 
thing curious  about  that  singing  of  yours.  The  time, 
the  place,  the  singers,  characterize  it  sharply  : the  wan- 
ing light,  the  rival  din,  the  girls  with  tired  faces.  You 
start  some  little  thing  with  a refrain,  and  a ring  to  it. 
A hymn,  it  is  not  unlikely  ; something  of  a River,  and  of 
Waiting,  and  of  Toil  and  Rest,  or  Sleep,  or  Crowns,  or 
Harps,  or  Home,  or  Green  Fields,  or  Flowers,  or  Sor- 
row, or  Repose,  or  a dozen  things  ; but  always  it  will  be 
noticed,  of  simple,  spotless  things,  such  as  will  surprise 
the  listener  who  caught  you  at  your  oath  of  five  minutes 
past.  You  have  other  songs,  neither  simple  nor  spot*, 
less,  it  may  be  ; but  you  never  sing  them  at  your  work 
when  the  waning  day  is  crawling  out  from  spots  be- 
neath your  loom,  and  the  girls  lift  up  their  tired  faces 
to  catch  and  keep  the  chorus  in  the  rival  din. 

You  like  to  watch  the  contest  between  the  chorus 
and  the  din  ; to  see — you  seem  almost  to  see — the 
struggle  of  the  melody  from  loom  to  loom,  from  dark- 
ening wall  to  darkening  wall,  from  lifted  face  to  lifted 
face  ; to  see — for  you  are  very  sure  you  see — the  ma- 
chinery fall  into  a fit  of  rage ; that  is  a sight ! You 
Would  never  guess,  unless  you  had  watched  it  just  as 


ELIZABETH  STUART  WARD 


19 


many  times  as  you  have,  how  that  machinery  will  rage  ; 
how  it  throws  its  arms  about  ; what  fists  it  can  clench ; 
how  it  shakes  at  the  elbows  and  knees  ; what  teeth  it 
knows  how  to  gnash  ; how  it  writhes  and  roars  ; how 
it  clutches  at  the  leaky  gas-lights  ; and  how  it  bends 
its  impudent  black  head  ; always,  at  last  without  fail, 
and  your  song  sweeps  triumphant  over  it ! With  this 
you  are  very  much  pleased,  though  only  a “ hand  ” in 
Hayle  and  Kelso’s. 

You  are  singing  when  the  bell  strikes,  and  singing 
still  when  you  clatter  down  the  stairs.  Something 
of  the  simple  spotlessness  of  the  little  song  is  on 
your  face  when  you  dip  into  the  wind  and  dusk.  Per- 
haps you  have  only  pinned  your  shawl  or  pulled  your 
hat  over  your  face,  or  knocked  against  a stranger  on 
the  walk.  But  it  passes  ; it  passes,  and  is  gone.  It  is 
cold  and  you  tremble,  direct  from  the  morbid  heat  in 
which  you  have  stood  all  day  ; or  you  have  been  cold 
all  day,  and  it  is  colder  and  you  shrink.  Or  you  are 
from  the  weaving-room,  and  the  wind  strikes  you  faint ; 
or  you  stop  to  cough,  and  the  girls  go  on  without  you. 
The  town  is  lighted,  and  the  people  are  out  in  their 
best  clothes.  You  pull  your  dingy  veil  about  your  eyes. 
You  are  weak  and  heart-sick  all  at  once.  You  don’t 
care  to  go  home  to  supper.  The  pretty  song  creeps 
back  for  the  engine  in  the  deserted  dark  to  crunch. 
You  are  a miserable  little  factory-girl  with  a dirty  face. 
— - The  Silent  Partner . 


AFTERWARD. 

There  is  no  vacant  chair.  The  loving  meet— 

A group  unbroken — smitten  who  knows  how? 

One  sitteth  silent  only,  in  his  usual  seat ; 

We  gave  him  once  that  freedom.  Why  not  now  ? 

Perhaps  he  is  too  weary,  and  needs  rest ; 

He  needed  it  too  often,  nor  could  we 
Bestow.  God  gave  it,  knowing  how  to  do  so  best. 
Which  of  us  would  disturb  him  ? Let  him  be. 
Vol.  XXIV.— a 


20 


ELIZABETH  STUART  WARD 


There  is  no  vacant  chair.  If  he  will  take 
The  mood  to  listen  mutely,  be  it  done. 

By  his  least  mood  we  crossed,  for  which  the  heart  must 
ache, 

Plead  not  nor  question  ! Let  him  have  this  one. 

Death  is  a mood  of  life.  It  is  no  whim 

By  which  life’s  Giver  mocks  a broken  heart. 

Death  is  life’s  reticence.  Still  audible  to  Him, 

The  hushed  voice,  happy,  speaketh  on,  apart. 

There  is  no  vacant  chair.  To  love  is  still 
To  have.  Nearer  to  memory  than  to  eye, 

And  dearer  yet  to  anguish  than  to  comfort,  will 
We  hold  him  by  our  love,  that  shall  not  die. 

For  while  it  doth  not,  thus  he  cannot.  Try  ! 

Who  can  put  out  the  motion  or  the  smile  ? 

The  old  ways  of  being  noble  all  with  him  laid  by  ? 
Because  we  love,  he  is.  Then  trust  awhile. 

— Song  of  the  Silent  World* 

NEW  NEIGHBORS. 

Within  the  window’s  scant  recess, 

Behind  a pink  geranium  flower, 

She  sits  and  sews,  and  sews  and  sits, 

From  patient  hour  to  patient  hour. 

As  woman-like  as  marble  is, 

Or  as  a lovely  death  might  be — 

A marble  death  condemned  to  make 
A feint  at  life  perpetually. 

Wondering,  I watch  to  pity  her  ; 

Wandering,  I go  my  restless  ways ; 

Content,  I think  the  untamed  thoughts 
Of  free  and  solitary  days, 

Until  the  mournful  dusk  begins 
To  drop  upon  the  quiet  street, 

Until,  upon  the  pavement  far, 

There  falls  the  sound  of  coming  feet  j 


ELIZABETH  STUART  WARD 


21 


A happy,  hastening,  ardent  sound. 

Tender  as  kisses  on  the  air — 

Quick,  as  if  touched  by  unseen  lips 
Blushes  the  little  statue  there ; 

And  woman-like  as  young  life  is. 

And  woman-like  as  joy  may  be, 

Tender  with  color,  lithe  with  love, 

She  starts,  transfigured  gloriously. 

Superb  in  one  transcendent  glance— 

Her  eyes,  I see,  are  burning  black — 

My  little  neighbor,  smiling,  turns, 

And  throws  my  unasked  pity  back. 

I wonder,  is  it  worth  the  while, 

To  sit  and  sew  from  hour  to  hour— 

To  sit  and  sew  with  eyes  of  black, 

Behind  a pink  geranium  flower  ? 

—Songs  of  the  Silent  Land 


WARD,  Mrs.  Humphry,  an  English  novelist, 
born  at  Hobart,  Tasmania,  in  1851.  Her  maiden 
name  was  Mary  Augusta  Arnold.  Her  father, 
Thomas — a younger  brother  of  Matthew  Arnold 
— was  a government  officer  in  Tasmania.  He  be- 
came afterward  a professor  in  the  Roman  Catho- 
lie  University  of  Dublin,  but,  losing  faith,  settled 
at  Oxford,  edited  books,  and  wrote  a manual  of 
English  Literature.  The  daughter  married  Thomas 
Humphry  Ward,  author  of  English  Poets , Men  of 
the  Reign , The  Reign  of  Queen  Victoria , etc.  Mrs. 
Ward  is  the  author  of  Milly  and  Oily,  or  a Holiday 
among  the  Mountains  (1880) ; Miss  Bret  her  ton  (1884) ; 
a translation  of  AmieV s Journal  (1885);  a critical 
estimate  of  Mrs.  Browning;  Robert  Elsmere,  a 
novel  (1888),  by  which  she  is  best  known  ; David 
Grieve  (1892) ; Marcella  (1894)  ; Sir  George  Tressady 
and  The  Story  of  Bessie  Costrell  (1895). 

Of  Robert  Elsmere,  William  Sharp  says:  “All 
that  the  critic  of  fiction  commonly  looks  to — inci- 
dent, evolution  of  plot,  artistic  sequence  of  events, 
and  so  forth — seems  secondary  when  compared 
with  the  startlingly  vivid  presentment  of  a human 
soul  in  the  storm  and  stress  incidental  to  the  re- 
nunciation of  past  spiritual  domination  and  the 
acceptance  of  new  hopes  and  aspirations.  . - . 

Merely  as  a tale  of  contemporary  English  life,  a 
fictitious  record  of  the  joys  and  sorrows,  loves 


MRS.  HUMPHRY  WARD 


23 


and  antagonisms,  fortune  and  misfortune,  of  men 
and  women  more  or  less  like  individuals  whom 
most  of  us  know,  it  is  keenly  interesting.  . . . 

Mrs.  Ward’s  literary  method  is  that  of  George 
Eliot ; indeed,  there  is  a curious  affinity  in  Rob- 
ert Elsmere  to  Adam  Bede — though  there  is  per- 
haps not  an  incident,  possibly  no  play  of  charac- 
ter, or  acute  side-light  or  vivifying  suggestion  that 
could  be  found  in  both,  while  the  plot  and  gener- 
al scheme  are  entirely  dissimilar.” 

OXFORD. 

The  weather  was  all  that  the  heart  of  man  could  de- 
sire, and  the  party  met  on  Paddington  platform  with 
every  prospect  of  another  successful  day.  Forbes 
turned  up  punctual  to  the  moment,  and  radiant  under 
the  combined  influence  of  the  sunshine  and  of  Miss 
Bretherton’s  presence;  Wallace  had  made  all  the  ar- 
rangements perfectly,  and  the  six  friends  found  them- 
selves presently  journeying  along  to  Oxford.  . . . 

At  last  the  “dreaming  spires”  of  Oxford  rose  from  the 
green,  river-threaded  plain,  and  they  were  at  their 
journey’s  end.  A few  more  minutes  saw  them  alighting 
at  the  gate  of  the  new  Bailiol,  where  stood  Herbert 
Sartoris  looking  out  for  them.  He  was  a young  don 
with  a classical  edition  on  hand  which  kept  him  work- 
ing up  after  term,  within  reach  of  the  libraries,  and  he 
led  the  way  to  some  pleasant  rooms  overlooking  the  in- 
ner quadrangle  of  Bailiol,  showing  in  his  well-bred  look 
and  manner  an  abundant  consciousness  of  the  enormous 
good  fortune  which  had  sent  him  Isabel  Bretherton  for 
a guest.  For  at  that  time  it  was  almost  as  difficult  to 
obtain  the  presence  of  Miss  Bretherton  at  any  social  fes- 
tivity as  it  was  to  obtain  that  of  royalty.  Her  Sundays 
were  the  objects  of  conspiracies  for  weeks  beforehand 
on  the  part  of  those  persons  in  London  society  who 
were  least  accustomed  to  have  their  invitations  refused, 
and  to  have  and  to  hold  the  famous  beauty  for  more 
than  an  hour  in  his  own  rooms,  and  then  to  enjoy  the 


24 


MRS.  HUMPHRY  WARD 


privilege  of  spending  five  or  six  long  hours  on  the  river 
with  her,  were  delights  which,  as  the  happy  young  man 
felt,  would  render  him  the  object  of  envy  to  all — at  least 
of  his  fellow-dons  below  forty. 

In  streamed  the  party,  filling  up  the  book-lined  rooms 
and  starting  the  two  old  scouts  in  attendance  into  un- 
wonted rapidity  of  action.  Miss  Bretherton  wandered 
around,  surveyed  the  familiar  Oxford  luncheon-table, 
groaning  under  the  time-honored  summer  fare,  the 
books,  the  engravings,  and  the  sunny,  irregular  quad- 
rangle outside,  with  its  rich  adornings  of  green,  and 
threw  herself  down  at  last  on  to  the  low  window-seat 
with  a sigh  of  satisfaction. 

“ How  quiet  you  are  ! how  peaceful ; how  delightful 
it  must  be  to  live  here ! It  seems  as  if  one  were  in  an- 
other world  from  London.  Tell  me  what  that  building 
is  over  there  ; it’s  too  new,  it  ought  to  be  old  and  gray 
like  the  colleges  we  saw  coming  up  here.  Is  everybody 
gone  away — ‘ gone  down,’  you  say  ? I should  like  to 
see  all  the  learned  people  walking  about  for  once.” 

“ I could  show  you  a good  many  if  there  were  time,” 
Said  young  Sartoris,  hardly  knowing,  however,  what  he 
was  saying,  so  lost  was  he  in  admiration  of  that  mar- 
vellous changing  face.  “ The  vacation  is  the  time  they 
show  themselves  ; it’s  like  owls  coming  out  at  night. 
You  see,  Miss  Bretherton,  we  don’t  keep  many  of  them  ; 
they  are  in  the  way  in  term-time.  But  in  vacation  they 
have  the  colleges  and  the  parks  and  the  Bodleian  to 
themselves  and  their  umbrellas,  under  the  most  favor- 
able conditions.” 

“Oh,  yes,”  said  Miss  Bretherton,  with  a little  scorn, 
“people  always  make  fun  of  what  they  are  proud  of. 
But  I mean  to  believe  that  you  are  all  learned,  and  that 
everybody  here  works  himself  to  death,  and  that  Oxford 
is  quite,  quite  perfect ! ” 

“ Did  you  hear  what  Miss  Bretherton  was  saying,  Mrs. 
Stuart?”  said  Forbes,  when  they  were  seated  at  lunch- 
eon. “ Oxford  is  perfect,  she  declares  already  ; I don’t 
think  I quite  like  it ; it’s  too  hot  to  last.” 

“Am  I such  a changeable  creature,  then  ?”  said  Miss 
Bretherton,  smiling  at  him.  “ Do  you  generally  find  my 
enthusiasms  cool  down?” 


OXFORD. 

Drawing  by  R.  Puettawr. 


» UBI4BY 
OF  THE 

mK*m  CFIIUMB 


MRS.  HUMPHRY  WARD 


2$ 

“ You  are  as  constant  as  you  are  kind,”  said  Forbes, 
bowing  to  her.  . . . “ Oh  ! the  good  times  I've  had 

up  here — much  better  than  he  ever  had  ” — nodding 
across  at  Kendal,  who  was  listening.  “ He  was  too 
properly  behaved  to  enjoy  himself ; he  got  all  the  right 
things,  all  the  proper  first-classes  and  prizes,  poor  fel- 
low ! But,  as  for  me,  I used  to  scribble  over  my  note- 
books all  lecture-time,  and  amuse  myself  the  rest  of  the 
day.  And  then,  you  see,  I was  up  twenty  years  earlier 
than  he  was,  and  the  world  was  not  as  virtuous  then  as 
it  is  now,  by  a long  way.” 

Kendal  was  interrupting,  when  Forbes,  who  was  in 
one  of  his  maddest  moods,  turned  around  upon  his 
chair  to  watch  a figure  passing  along  the  quadrangle  in 
ifront  of  the  bay-window. 

“ I say,  Sartoris,  isn’t  that  Camden,  the  tutor  who  was 
turned  out  of  Magdalen  a year  or  two  ago  for  that 
atheistical  book  of  his,  and  whom  you  took  in,  as  you 
do  all  the  disreputables  ? Ah,  I knew  it ! 

“ 4 By  the  pricking  of  my  thumbs 

Something  wicked  this  way  comes.’ 

That’s  not  mine,  my  dear  Miss  Bretherton  ; it’s  Shake- 
speare’s first,  Charles  Lamb’s  afterward.  But  look  at 
him  well— -he’s  a heretic,  a real,  genuine  heretic.  Twen- 
ty years  ago  it  would  have  been  a thrilling  sight  ; but 
now,  alas  ! it’s  so  common  that  it’s  not  the  victim  but 
the  persecutors  who  are  the  curiosity.” 

“ I don’t  know  that,”  said  young  Sartoris.  “ We  liber- 
als are  by  no  means  the  cocks  of  the  walk  that  we  were 
a few  years  ago.  You  see,  now  we  have  got  nothing  to 
pull  against,  as  it  were.  So  long  as  we  had  two  or  three 
good  grievances,  we  could  keep  the  party  together,  and 
attract  all  the  young  men.  We  were  Israel  going  up 
against  the  Philistines,  who  had  us  in  their  grip.  But 
now,  things  are  changed  ; we’ve  got  our  way  all  round, 
and  it’s  the  Church  party  who  have  the  grievances  and 
the  cry.  It  is  we  who  are  the  Philistines,  and  the 
oppressors  in  our  turn,  and,  of  course,  the  young  men 
as  they  grow  up  are  going  into  the  opposition.” 

“And  a very  good  thing,  too  ! ” said  Forbes.  “It’s 
the  only  thing  that  prevents  Oxford  becoming  as  dull  as 


MRS.  HUMPHRY  WARD 


J& 

the  rest  of  the  world.  All  your  picturesqueness,  so  to 
speak,  has  been  struck  out  of  the  struggle  between  the 
two  forces.  The  Church  force  is  the  one  that  has  given 
you  all  your  buildings  and  your  beauty,  while  as  for  you 
liberals,  who  will  know  such  a lot  of  things  that  you’re 
none  the  happier  for  knowing — well,  I suppose  you 
keep  the  place  habitable  for  the  plain  man  who  doesn’t 
want  to  be  bullied.  But  it’s  a very  good  thing  the  other 
side  are  strong  enough  to  keep  you  in  order.”  . . . 

Then  they  strolled  into  the  quiet  cathedral,  delighted 
themselves  with  its  irregular,  bizarre  beauty,  its  unex- 
pected turns  and  corners,  which  gave  it  a capricious, 
fanciful  air,  for  all  the  solidity  and  business-like  strength 
of  its  Norman  framework ; and  as  they  rambled  jout 
again,  Forbes  made  them  pause  over  a window  in  the 
northern  aisle — a window  by  some  Flemish  artist  of  the 
fifteenth  century,  who  seems  to  have  embodied  in  it  at 
once  all  his  knowledge  and  all  his  dreams.  In  front 
sat  Jonah  under  his  golden-tinted  gourd — an  ill-tem- 
pered Flemish  peasant — while  behind  him  the  indented 
roofs  of  the  Flemish  town  climbed  the  whole  height  of 
the  background.  It  was  probably  the  artist’s  native 
town  ; some  roof  among  those  carefully  outlined  gables 
sheltered  his  household  Lares.  But  the  hill  on  which 
the  town  stood,  and  the  mountainous  background  and 
the  purple  sea,  were  the  hills  and  the  sea  not  of  Bel- 
gium, but  of  a dream-country — of  Italy,  perhaps,  the 
mediaeval  artist’s  paradise. 

“ Happy  man  ! ” said  Forbes,  turning  to  Miss  Brether- 
ton  ; “look,  he  put  it  together  four  centuries  ago — all 
he  knew  and  all  he  dreamt  of.  And  there  it  is  to  this 
day,  and  beyond  the  spirit  of  that  window  there  is  no 
getting.  For  all  our  work,  if  we  do  .it  honestly,  is  a 
compound  of  what  we  know  and  what  we  dream.”  . . . 

They  passed  out  into  the  cool  and  darkness  of  the 
cloisters,  and  through  the  new  buildings,  and  soon  they 
were  in  the  Broad  Walk,  trees  as  old  as  the  Common- 
wealth bending  overhead,  and  in  front  the  dazzling 
green  of  the  June  meadows,  the  shining  river  in  the  dis- 
tance, and  the  sweep  of  cloud-flecked  blue  arching  in 
the  whole. — Miss  Bretherton. 


WARD,  Nathaniel,  an  English  clergyman  and 
satirist,  born,  probably  at  Haverhill,  in  1578;  died 
at  Shenfield,  England,  in  1653.  He  was  the  son 
of  John  Ward,  a famous  Puritan  minister,  was 
graduated  at  Cambridge  in  1603,  studied  law, 
which  he  practised  in  England,  and  travelled  ex- 
tensively. He  entered  the  ministry,  and  on  his 
return  to  England  held  a pastorate  in  Sussex.  In 
1631  he  was  tried  for  nonconformity  by  Arch- 
bishop Laud,  and,  though  he  escaped  excommuni- 
cation, was  deprived  of  his  charge.  In  1634  he 
sailed  for  New  England,  and  became  colleague 
to  the  Rev.  Thomas  Parker  at  Ipswich.  He  re- 
signed in  1636,  but  resided  at  Ipswich  and  com- 
piled for  the  colony  of  Massachusetts  The  Body  of 
Liberties,  which  was  adopted  by  the  General  Court 
in  1641,  and  which  was  the  first  code  of  laws  es- 
tablished in  New  England.  In  1646  he  returned 
to  England,  and  became  pastor  of  a church  in 
Shenfield,  which  post  he  held  until  his  death. 
While  in  America  he  published  77/-?  Simple  Cobbler 
of  Agawam,  in  America,  Willing  to  Help  Mend  his 
Native  Country,  Lamentably  Tattered  both  in  the  Up- 
per-Leather and  the  Sole . His  Simple  Cobbler  s Boy 
with  his  Lap-full  of  Caveats,  was  written  in  Amer- 
ica and  published  under  the  pen-name  of  Theodore 
de  la  Guard  in  1646.  Two  American  editions 
have  been  issued,  one  in  Boston  in  1718,  the  other, 
edited  by  David  Pulsifer,  in  1843. 

(27) 


NATHANIEL  WARD 


C8 


TO  THE  NEEDLESSE  TAYLOU* 

From  his  working  ( im — ) posture . 

Let  him  beware  that  his  dispositions  be  not  more 
crosse  than  his  legges  or  sheeres. 

If  he  will  be  a Church  member,  he  must  remember  to 
away  with  his  crosse  + members.  For  Churches  must 
have  no  Crosses,  nor  kewcaws.  Againe, 

He  must  not  leap  from  the  Shop-board  into  the  Pul- 
pit to  make  a sermon  without  tayle  or  head,  nor  with 
a Taylor's  head. 


From  the  patch. 

Let  him  take  heed  he  make  not  a Sermon  like  a Beg- 
gar’s cloak  pacht  up  of  a thousand  ragges,  most  dou- 
terty,  nor,  like  his  own  fundamental!  Cushion,  boch't  up 
of  innumerable  shreds,  and  every  one  of  a several  colour 
(not  a couple  of  parishioners  among  them)  and  stuft 
with  nothing  but  bran,  chaffe,  and  the  like  lumber, 
scarce  fit  for  the  streete. 

Let  him  not  for  a Needle  mistake  a Pen,  and  write 
guil-lets,  making  a Goose  of  himself. 

Take  heede  of  the  hot  Iron  there. 

Let  him  not  insteed  of  pressing  cloth  oppresse  truth, 
nor  put  errors  into  the  Presse. 

The  Hand  and  Sheeres  do  speak  this  cutting  lan- 
guage. 

Keep  to  thy  Calling  Mr.  and  cut  thy  coat  according 
to  thy  cloth.  Neglect  not  to  use  thy  brown  thread, 
lest  thy  Family  want  browne  bread,  and  suffer  a sharp 
stitch. 

The  Breeches  with  wide  nostrils  do  Promulgate  this 
Canon-law. 

That  the  Taylor  (when  he  preaches)  be  sure  to  ex- 
claim against  the  new  Fashions  (a  disease  incident  unto 
Horses  and  Asses)  that  so  he  live  not  by  others  pride, 
while  he  exhorts  to  humility.  The  Tub  of  shreds  ut- 
ters Ferking  advice  That  he  do  not  filch  Cloths,  Silkes, 
Velvets,  Sattins,  etc.,  in  private  nor  pilfer  Time  from 


NATHANIEL  WARD 


others  in  publike,  nor  openly  rob  Ministers  of  their  em- 
ployment, nor  secretly  tell  any  secret  lye. 

From  the  out  (side)  facings  counsaile  that  he  do  not 
cloak-over  any  tattered  suit  of  hypocritical  knavery 
with  a fair-facing  of  an  outside  profession. 

Well  to  the  Point. 

That  he  consider  that  as  a Needle,  the  thread  or 
silk,  so  a Schismatick,  drawes  a long  traine  of  folly- 
followers  after  him,  when  he  deales  in  points  by  the 
dozen. 

From  the  Seame-rippings . 

That  Hereticall  opinions,  unlesse  they  be  ript  open, 
are  of  as  dangerous  consequence  as  an  hempen  collar, 
etc.,  a man  were  better  be  hanged,  than  to  have  his  im- 
mortal soul  stifled  therewith.— The  Simple  Cobbler's  Boy. 

MINISTERS. 

A profound  Heretick  is  like  a huge  Tub  full  of  sir- 
rup,  his  followers  are  like  Wasps  and  Gadflies  that  buz 
and  frisk  about  him,  and  sting  at  them  that  would  keep 
them  off  : but  at  last  they  are  so  entangled  in  the 
slimy  pap,  that  it  is  a thousand  unto  one  if  ever  they 
returne  safe,  but  there  they  dye  and  make  the  sirrup  of 
their  Tenets  to  stink  intolerably. 

But  a Godly  and  learned  Minister  is  like  a Master- 
Bee,  the  Word  and  the  World  are  his  Garden  and  Field, 
the  works  of  God  and  his  Divine  truths  are  his  Flow- 
ers ; Peace  of  Conscience,  Joy  in  the  Holy-Ghost,  the 
consolations  of  Christ  are  his  Honey ; his  Heart  is  an 
Hive,  his  Head  is  an  Honey-Comb  ; reproof  is  his  sting 
wherewith  he  spurs  on,  or  spumes  away  the  sluggish 
Drone,  Ignavum  fucos  Pecus , etc.  The  Bee  was  born  a 
Confectioner,  and  though  he  make  but  one  sort  of  con- 
fection, yet  it  easily  transcends  all  the  Art  of  man  : 

For, 

The  Bees’  work  is  pure,  unmixt,  Virgin  honey ; man’s 
knick-knacks  are  jumbled  and  blended.  I apply  it 
God’s  Word  is  pure,  man’s  invention  is  mixt. 


NATHANIEL  WARD 


Then  if  in  Manna  you  will  trade, 

You  must  boyle  no  more  Marmolade. 

Lay  by  your  Diet-bread  and  slicing-knife, 

If  you  intend  to  break  the  Bread  of  Life. 

— Simple  Cobbler's  Boy. 

ON  THE  FRIVOLITIES  OF  FASHION. 

Should  I not  keep  promise  in  speaking  a little  to 
women’s  fashions’  they  would  take  it  unkindly.  I was 
loath  to  pester  better  matter  with  such  stuff ; T rather 
thought  it  meet  to  let  them  stand  by  themselves,  like 
the  Quce  Genus  in  the  grammar,  being  deficients,  or  re- 
dundants,  not  to  be  brought  under  any  rule  : I shall 
therefore  make  bold  for  this  once,  to  borrow  a little  of 
their  loose-tongued  Liberty,  and  misspend  a word  or 
two  upon  their  long-waisted,  but  short-skirted  Patience  : 
a little  use  of  my  stirrup  will  do  no  harm. 

Ridentem  dicer e verum , quid prohibet  ? 

Gray  Gravity  itself  can  well  beteem, 

That  language  be  adapted  to  the  theme. 

He  that  to  parrots  speaks  must  parrotise  : 

He  that  instructs  a fool  may  act  th’  unwise. 

It  is  known  more  than  enough  that  I am  neither  nig- 
gard, nor  cynic,  to  the  due  bravery  of  the  true  gentry. 
I honor  the  woman  that  can  honor  herself  with  her  at- 
tire ; a good  text  always  deserves  a fair  margin  ; I am 
not  much  offended  if  I see  a trim  far  trimmer  than  she 
wears  it.  In  a word,  whatever  Christianity  or  civility 
will  allow,  I can  afford  with  London  measure  : but  when 
I hear  a nugiperous  gentledame  inquire  what  dress  the 
Queen  is  in  this  week  : what  the  nudiustertian  fashion 
of  the  Court,  with  egg  to  be  in  it  in  all  haste,  whatever 
it  be,  I look  at  her  as  the  very  gizzard  of  a trifle,  the 
product  of  a quarter  of  a cipher,  the  epitome  of  noth- 
ing, fitter  to  be  kicked,  if  she  were  of  a kickable  sub- 
stance, than  either  honored  or  humored. 

To  speak  moderately,  I truly  confess  it  is  beyond  the 
ken  of  my  understanding  to  conceive  how  these  women 
should  have  any  true  grace,  or  valuable  virtue,  that 
have  so  little  wit,  as  to  disfigure  themselves  with  such 


NATHANIEL  WARD 


31 


exotic  garbs,  as  not  only  dismantles  their  native  lovely 
lustre,  but  transclouts  them  into  gantbar-geese,  ill- 
shapen,  shell-fish,  Egyptian  hieroglyphics,  or  at  least 
into  French  flurts  of  the  pastery,  which  a proper  Eng- 
lish woman  should  scorn  with  her  heels.  It  is  no  mar- 
vel they  wear  drailes  on  the  hinder  part  of  their  heads, 
having  nothing,  as  it  seems,  in  the  fore-part,  but  a few 
squirrels’  brains  to  help  them  frisk  from  one  ill-favored 
fashion  to  another. 

These  whimm’  Crown’d  shees,  these  fashion-fancying  wits, 

Are  empty  thin  brained  shells,  and  fiddling  Kits, 

the  very  troublers  and  impoverishers  of  mankind.  I 
can  hardly  forbear  to  commend  to  the  world  a saying 
of  a Lady  living  some  time  with  the  Queen  of  Bohemia ; 
I know  not  where  she  found  it,  but  it  is  a pity  it  should 
be  lost. 

The  world  is  full  of  care,  much  like  unto  a bubble, 

Women  and  care,  and  care  and  women,  and  women  and  care  and 
trouble. 

The  verses  are  even  enough  for  such  odd  pegma.  I 
can  make  myself  sick  at  any  time,  with  comparing  the 
dazzling  splendor  wherewith  our  gentlewomen  were 
embellished  in  some  former  habits,  with  the  gutfoun- 
ered  goosedom,  wherewith  they  are  now  surcingled  and 
debauched.  We  have  about  five  or  six  of  them  in  our 
colony  ; if  I see  any  of  them  accidentally,  I cannot 
cleanse  my  fancy  of  them  for  a month  after.  I have 
been  a solitary  widower  almost  twelve  years,  purposed 
lately  to  make  a step  over  to  my  native  country  for  a 
yoke-fellow  : but  when  I consider  how  women  there 
have  tripe-wifed  themselves  with  their  cladments,  I 
have  no  heart  for  the  voyage,  lest  their  nauseous  shapes 
and  the  sea  should  work  too  sorely  upon  my  stomach. 
I speak  sadly  ; methinks  it  should  break  the  hearts  of 
English  men,  to  see  so  many  goodly  English  women 
imprisoned  in  French  cages,  peering  out  of  /.heir  hood 
holes  for  some  of  mercy  to  help  them  with/a  little  wit, 
and  nobody  relieves  them. 

It  is  a more  common  than  convenient  saying,  that 
nine  tailors  make  a man  * it  were  well  if  nineteen 


32 


NATHANIEL  WARD 


could  make  a woman  to  her  mind.  If  tailors  were  men 
indeed  well  furnished  but  with  mere  moral  principles, 
they  would  disdain  to  be  led  about  like  apes  by  such 
mimic  marmosets.  It  is  a most  unworthy  thing  for  men 
that  have  bones  in  them  to  spend  their  lives  in  making 
fiddle-cases  for  futilous  women’s  fancies  ; which  are  the 
very  pettitoes  of  infirmity,  the  giblets  of  perquisquilian 
toys.  I am  so  charitable  to  think  that  most  of  that 
mystery  would  work  the  cheerfuller  while  they  live,  if 
they  might  be  well  discharged  of  the  tiring  slavery  of 
mistiring  women.  It  is  no  little  labor  to  be  continually 
putting  up  English  women  into  outlandish  casks  ; who 
if  they  be  not  shifted  anew,  once  in  a few  months,  grow 
too  sour  for  their  husbands.  What  this  trade  will  an- 
swer for  themselves  when  God  shall  take  measure  of 
tailors’  consciences  is  beyond  my  skill  to  imagine. 

There  was  a time  when 

The  joining  of  the  Red  Rose  with  the  White, 

Did  set  our  State  into  a Damask  plight. 

But  now  our  roses  are  turned  to  flore  de  lices,  our 
carnations  to  tulips,  our  gillyflowers  to  daisies,  our  city 
dames  to  an  indenominable  quaemalry  of  overturcased 
things.  He  that  makes  coats  for  the  moon  had  need 
take  measures  every  noon  : and  he  that  makes  for  wom- 
en, as  often,  to  keep  them  from  lunacy. 

I have  often  heard  divers  ladies  vent  loud  feminine 
complaints  of  the  wearisome  varieties  and  chargeable 
changes  of  fashions  : I marvel  themselves  prefer  not  a 
Bill  of  redress.  I would  Essex  ladies  would  lead  the 
chore,  for  the  honor  of  their  country  and  persons  ; or 
rather  the  thrice  honorable  ladies  of  the  court,  whom  it 
best  beseems : who  may  well  presume  of  a Le  Roy  le 
veult  from  our  sober  king,  a Les  Seigneurs  ont  assentus 
from  our  prudent  peers,  and  the  like  assentus , from  our 
considerate,  I dare  not  say  wife-worn  Commons  ; who  I 
believe  had  much  rather  pass  one  such  bill  than  pay  so 
many  tailors’  bills  as  they  are  forced  to  do. 

Most  dear  and  unparalleled  Ladies,  be  pleased  to  at- 
tempt it : as  you  have  the  precellency  of  the  women  of 
the  world  for  beauty  and  feature,  so  assume  the  honor 
to  give,  and  not  take  law  from  any,  in  matter  of  attire. 


NATHANIEL  WARD 


33 


If  ye  can  transact  so  fair  a motion  among  yourselves 
unanimously,  I dare  say  they  that  most  renite  will  least 
repent.  What  greater  honor  can  your  Honors  desire 
than  to  build  a promontory  precedent  to  all  foreign 
ladies,  to  deserve  so  eminently  at  the  hands  of  all  the 
English  gentry  present  and  to  come  : and  to  confute 
the  opinion  of  all  the  wise  men  in  the  world  ; who  never 
thought  it  possible  for  women  to  do  so  good  a work. 

If  any  man  think  I have  spoken  rather  merrily  than 
seriously,  he  is  much  mistaken,  I have  written  what  I 
write  with  all  the  indignation  I can,  and  no  more  than 
I ought.  I confess  I veered  my  tongue  to  this  kind  of 
language  de  industria , though  unwillingly,  supposing  those 
I speak  to  are  uncapable  of  grave  and  rational  arguments. 

I desire  all  ladies  and  gentlewomen  to  understand 
that  all  this  while  I intend  not  such  as,  through  neces- 
sary modesty  to  avoid  morose  singularity,  follow  fash- 
ions slowly,  a flight  shot  or  two  off,  showing  by  their 
moderation  that  they  rather  draw  countermont  with 
their  hearts  than  put  on  by  their  examples. 

I point  my  pen  only  against  the  light-heeled  beagles 
that  lead  the  chase  so  fast  that  they  run  all  civility  out 
of  breath,  against  these  ape-headed  pullets  which  invent 
antique  fool-fangles,  merely  for  fashion  and  novelty  sake. 

In  a word,  if  I begin  once  to  declaim  against  fash- 
ions, let  men  and  women  look  well  about  them,  there  is 
somewhat  in  the  business  ; I confess  to  the  world,  I 
never  had  grace  enough  to  be  strict  in  that  kind  ; and 
of  late  years,  I have  found  syrup  of  pride  very  whole- 
some in  a due  dose,  which  makes  me  keep  such  store  of 
that  drug  by  me,  that  if  anybody  comes  to  me  for  a 
question-full  or  two  about  fashions,  they  never  com- 
plain of  me  for  giving  them  hard  measure,  or  under 
weight. 

But  I address  myself  to  those  who  can  both  hear 
and  mend  all  if  they  please  : I seriously  fear,  if  the 
Pious  Parliament  do  not  find  time  to  state  fashions,  as 
ancient  Parliaments  have  done  in  a part,  God  will  hard- 
ly find  a time  to  state  religion  or  peace.  They  are  the 
surquedryes  of  pride,  the  wantonness  of  idleness,  pro- 
voking sins,  the  certain  prodromies  of  assured  judg* 
i*  7,  8. 


34 


NATHANIEL  WARD 


It  is  beyond  all  account  how  many  gentlemen’s  and 
citizens'  estates  are  deplumed  by  their  feather-headed 
wives,  what  useful  supplies  the  pannage  of  England 
would  afford  other  countries,  what  rich  returns  to  itself, 
if  it  were  not  sliced  out  into  male  and  female  frip- 
peries : and  what  a multitude  of  misemployed  hands 
might  be  better  improved  in  some  more  manly  manu- 
factures for  the  public  weal.  It  is  not  easily  credible, 
what  may  be  said  of  the  preterpluralities  of  tailors  in 
London  : I have  heard  an  honest  man  say  that  not 
long  since  there  were  numbered  between  Temple-bar 
and  Charing-Cross  eight  thousand  of  that  trade  ; let  it 
be  conjectured  by  that  proportion  how  many  there  are 
in  and  about  London,  and  in  all  England  they  will  ap- 
pear to  be  very  numerous.  If  the  Parliament  would 
please  to  mend  women,  which  their  husbands  dare  not 
do,  there  need  not  so  many  men  to  make  and  mend  as 
there  are.  I hope  the  present  doleful  estate  of  the 
realm  will  persuade  more  strongly  to  some  considerate 
course  herein  than  I now  can. 

Knew  I how  to  bring  it  in,  I would  speak  a word  to 
long  hair,  whereof  I will  say  no  more  but  this  : if  God 
proves  not  such  a barber  to  it  as  he  threatens,  unless  it 
be  amended,  Isai.  vii.  20,  before  the  peace  of  the  State 
and  Church  be  well  settled,  then  let  my  prophecy  be 
scorned,  as  a sound  mind  scorns  the  riot  of  that  sin, 
and  more  it  needs  not.  If  those  who  are  termed  rattle- 
heads  and  impuritans  would  take  up  a resolution  to  be- 
gin in  moderation  of  hair  to  the  just  reproach  of  those 
that  are  called  Puritans  and  Roundheads,  I would  honor 
their  manliness  as  much  as  the  others’  godliness,  so 
long  as  I knew  what  man  or  honor  meant : if  neither 
can  find  a barber’s  shop,  let  them  turn  in,  to  Psalm 
lxviii.  21,  Jer.  7,  29,  1 Cor.  xi.  14.  If  it  be  thought  no 
wisdom  in  men  to  distinguish  themselves  in  the  field  by 
the  scissors,  let  it  be  thought  no  injustice  in  God  not 
to  distinguish  them  by  the  sword.  I had  rather  God 
should  know  me  by  my  sobriety  than  mine  enemy  not 
know  me  by  my  vanity.  He  is  ill  kept  that  is  kept  by 
his  own  sin.  A short  promise  is  a far  safer  god  than  a 
long  lock  : it  is  an  ill  distinction  which  God  is  loath  to 
look  at. — The  Simple  Cobbler  of  Agawam. 


NATHANIEL  WARD 


35 


SIX  HOBNAILS. 

I pray  let  me  drive  in  half  a dozen  plain  honest 
country  hobnails,  such  as  the  martyrs  were  wont  to 
wear,  to  make  my  work  hold  the  surer,  and  I have 
done  : 


There  lives  cannot  be  good, 

There  faith  cannot  be  sure 
Where  truth  cannot  be  quiet, 

Nor  ordinances  pure. 

No  King  can  king  it  right, 

Nor  rightly  sway  his  rod, 

Who  truly  loves  not  Christ, 

And  truly  fears  not  God. 

He  cannot  rule  a land, 

As  lands  should  ruled  been, 

That  lets  himself  be  rul’d 
By  a ruling  Roman  Queen. 

No  earthly  man  can  be 
True  subject  to  this  State, 

Who  makes  the  Pope  his  Christ, 

An  heretic  his  mate. 

There  Peace  will  go  to  war, 

And  Silence  make  a noise, 

Where  upper  things  will  not 
With  nether  equipoise. 

The  upper  world  shall  rule, 

While  stars  will  run  their  race  : 

The  nether  World  obey, 

While  people  keep  their  place* 

THE  CLENCH. 

If  any  of  these  come  out 
So  long’s  the  world  do  last 
Then  credit  not  a word 
Of  what  is  said  and  past. 

— The  Simple  Cobbler  of  Agawam. 

VOL.  XXIV.— 3 


WARE,  William,  an  American  historical  nov- 
elist, born  at  Hingham,  Mass.,  August  3,  1797; 
died  at  Cambridge,  February  19,  1852.  He  wa9 
the  grandson  of  Henry  Ware,  prominent  in  the 
Unitarian  controversy,  and  was  one  of  a family  of 
authors.  Graduating  at  Harvard  in  1816,  and 
the  Divinity  School  in  1819,  he  was  pastor  in 
Northboro,  Waltham,  and  West  Cambridge,  Mass., 
and  from  1821-36  in  New  York  City.  His  Letters 
from  Palmyra  (183 7)  were  published  in  1868,  as 
Zenobiay  or  the  Fall  of  Palmyra.  Probus  (1838),  was 
afterward  entitled  Aurelian.  These,  with  Julian, 
or  Scenes  in  Judea  (1841),  gained  him  much  repu- 
tation  as  an  historical  novelist.  His  other  works 
are  American  Unitarian  Biography  (1850-51); 
Sketches  of  European  Capitals  (1851);  Lectures  on 
the  Works  and  Genius  of  Washington  Allston  (1&52) ; 
Memoir  of  Nathaniel  Bacon  in  Sparks’s  American 
Biography  (1841).  From  1839  to  1844  he  edited 
the  Christian  Examiner . 

Of  his  Zenobia,  Andrews  Norton,  in  the  North 
American  Review,  says:  “ The  scene,  the  charac- 
ters, and  the  historical  events  are  finely  selected ; 
for  they  abound  with  striking  images  and  associa- 
tions. . . . It  is  not  a work  of  an  ordinary 

character.  It  is  the  production  of  a thought- 
ful, able,  imaginative,  and,  above  all,  a pure  and 


WILLIAM  WAkE 


37 


right-minded  author,  of  clear  thoughts  and  sound 
sense.” 

“ There  is  not  a trace  of  modern  habits  or  modes 
of  thinking,”  says  Miss  Mitford,  of  Aurelian ; “and 
if  Ware  had  been  possessed  by  the  monomania  of 
Macpherson  or  Chatterton,  it  would  have  rested 
with  himself  to  produce  these  letters  as  a close 
and  literal  version  of  manuscripts  of  the  third 
century.” 

PALMYRA. 

It  was  several  miles  before  we  reached  the  city,  that 
we  suddenly  found  ourselves — landing  as  it  were  from 
a sea  upon  an  island  or  continent — in  a rich  or  thickly 
peopled  country.  The  roads  indicated  an  approach  to 
a great  capital,  in  the  increasing  numbers  of  those  who 
thronged  them,  meeting  and  passing  us,  overtaking  us, 
or  crossing  our  way.  Elephants,  camels,  and  the  drom- 
edary, which  I had  before  seen  only  in  the  amphithe- 
atres, I here  beheld  as  the  native  inhabitants  of  the  soil. 
Frequently  villas  of  the  rich  and  luxurious  Palmyrenes, 
to  which  they  retreat  from  the  greater  heats  of  the  city, 
now  threw  a lovely  charm  over  the  scene.  Nothing  can 
exceed  the  splendor  of  those  sumptuous  palaces.  Italy 
itself  has  nothing  which  surpasses  them.  The  new  and 
brilliant  costumes  of  the  persons  whom  we  met,  together 
with  the  rich  housings  of  the  animals  they  rode,  served 
greatly  to  add  to  all  this  beauty.  I was  still  entranced, 
as  it  were,  by  the  objects  around  me,  and  buried  in 
reflection  ; when  I was  roused  by  the  shout  of  those 
who  led  the  caravan,  and  who  had  attained  the  summit 
of  a little  rising  ground,  saying,  “ Palmyra  ! Palmyra ! ” 
i urged  forward  my  steed,  and  in  a moment  the  most 
wonderful  prpspect  I ever  beheld— no,  I cannot  except 
even  Rome — burst  upon  my  sight.  Flanked  by  hills  of 
considerable  elevation  on  the  east,  the  city  filled  the 
whole  plain  below  as  far  as  the  eye  could  reach,  both 
toward  the  north  and  toward  the  south.  This  immense 
plain  was  all  one  vast  and  boundless  city.  It  seemed 
to  me  to  be  larger  than  Rome.  Yet  I knew  very  well 


WILLIAM  WARE 


3* 

that  it  could  not  be — that  it  was  not.  And  it  was  some 
time  before  I understood  the  true  character  of  the  scene 
before  me,  so  as  to  separate  the  city  from  the  country, 
and  the  country  from  the  city,  which  here  wonderfully 
interpenetrate  each  other  and  so  confound  and  deceive 
the  observer.  For  the  city  proper  is  so  studded  with 
groups  of  lofty  palm-trees,  shooting  up  among  its  tem- 
ples and  palaces,  and  on  the  other  hand,  the  plain  in  its 
immediate  vicinity  is  so  thickly  adorned  with  magnifi- 
cent structures  of  the  purest  marble,  that  it  is  not  easy, 
nay,  it  is  impossible,  at  the  distance  at  which  I contem- 
plated the  whole,  to  distinguish  the  line  which  divided 
the  one  from  the  other.  It  was  all  city  and  all  country, 
all  country  and  all  city.  Those  which  lay  before  me  I 
was  ready  to  believe  were  the  Elysian  Fields.  I im- 
agined that  I saw  under  my  feet  the  dwellings  of  purified 
men  and  of  gods.  Certainly  they  were  too  glorious  for  the 
mere  earth-born.  There  was  a central  point,  however, 
which  chiefly  fixed  my  attention,  where  the  vast  Temple 
of  the  sun  stretched  upward  its  thousand  columns  of 
polished  marble  to  the  heavens,  in  its  matchless  beautiy 
casting  into  the  shade  every  other  work  of  art  of  which 
the  world  can  boast.  I have  stood  before  the  Parthenon, 
and  have  almost  worshipped  that  divine  achievement  of 
the  immortal  Phidias.  But  it  is  a toy  by  the  side  of  this 
bright  crown  of  the  Eastern  capital.  I have  been  at 
Milan,  at  Ephesus,  at  Alexandria,  at  Antioch ; but  in 
neither  of  these  renowned  cities  have  I beheld  anything 
that  I can  allow  to  approach  in  united  extent,  grandeur, 
and  most  consummate  beauty  this  almost  more  than 
work  of  man.  On  each  side  of  this,  the  central  point, 
there  rose  upward  slender  pyramids — pointed  obelisks — 
domes  of  the  most  graceful  proportions,  columns,  arches, 
and  lofty  towers,  for  numbers  and  for  form,  beyond  my 
power  to  describe.  These  buildings,  as  well  as  the  walls 
of  the  city,  being  all  either  of  white  marble,  or  of  some 
stone  as  white,  and  being  everywhere  in  their  whole  ex- 
tent interspersed,  as  I have  already  said,  with  multitudes 
of  overshadowing  palm-trees,  perfectly  filled  and  satis- 
fied my  sense  of  beauty,  and  made  me  feel,  for  the  mo- 
ment, as  if  in  such  a scene  I shon1^  love  to  dwell,  and 
there  end  my  days. 


WILLIAM  WARE 


39 


ZENOBIA  THE  CAPTIVE. 

And  it  was  the  ninth  hour  before  the  alternate  shouts 
and  deep  silence  of  the  multitudes  announced  that  the 
conqueror  was  drawing  near  the  capitol.  As  the  first 
shout  arose,  I turned  toward  the  quarter  whence  it 
came,  and  beheld,  not  Aurelian,  as  I expected,  but  the 
Gallic  Emperor  Tetricus — yet  slave  of  his  army  and  of 
Victoria — accompanied  by  the  prince  his  son,  and  fol- 
lowed by  other  illustrious  captives  from  Gaul.  All  eyes 
were  turned  with  pity  upon  him,  and  with  indignation 
too  that  Aurelian  should  thus  treat  a Roman,  and  once 
a Senator.  But  sympathy  for  him  was  instantly  lost 
in  a stronger  feeling  of  the  same  kind  for  Zenobia,  who 
came  immediately  after.  You  can  imagine,  Fausta, 
better  than  I can  describe  them,  my  sensations,  when  I 
saw  our  beloved  friend — her  whom  I had  seen  treated 
never  otherwise  than  as  a sovereign  Queen,  and  with 
all  the  imposing  pomp  of  the  Persian  ceremonial — now 
on  foot,  and  exposed  to  the  rude  gaze  of  the  Roman 
populace — toiling  beneath  the  rays  of  a hot  sun,  and 
the  weight  of  jewels  such  as  both  for  richness  and 
beauty,  were  never  before  seen  in  Rome — and  of  chains 
of  gold,  which,  first  passing  around  her  neck  and  arms, 
were  then  borne  up  by  attendant  slaves.  I could  have 
wept  to  see  her  go — yes,  and  did.  My  impulse  was  to 
break  through  the  crowd  and  support  her  almost  faint- 
ing form — but  I well  knew  that  my  life  would  answer 
for  the  rashness  on  the  spot.  I could  only,  therefore, 
like  the  rest,  wonder  and  gaze.  And  never  did  she 
seem  to  me,  not  even  in  the  midst  of  her  own  court,  to 
blaze  forth  with  such  transcendent  beauty — yet  touched 
with  grief.  Her  look  was  not  that  of  dejection,  of  one 
who  was  broken  and  crushed  by  misfortune — there  was 
no  blush  of  shame.  It  was  rather  one  of  profound, 
heart-breaking  melancholy.  Her  full  eyes  looked  as  if 
privacy  only  was  wanted  for  them  to  overflow  with 
floods  of  tears.  But  they  fell  not.  Her  gaze  was  fixed 
on  vacancy,  or  else  cast  toward  the  ground.  She 
seemed  like  one  unobservant  of  all  around  her,  and  bur- 
ied in  thoughts  to  which  all  else  were  strangers,  and 

' V 


40 


WtlLtAM  WARM 


had  nothing  in  common  with  They  were  In  Palmy*** 
and  with  her  slaughtered  multitudes.  Yet  though  she 
wept  not,  others  did  ; and  one  could  see  all  along, 
wherever  she  moved,  the  Roman  hardness  yielding  to 
pity,  and  melting  down  before  the  all-subduing  pres- 
ence of  this  wonderful  woman.  The  most  touching 
phrases  of  compassion  fell  constantly  upon  my  ear. 
And  ever  and  anon  as  in  the  road  there  would  happen 
some  rough  or  damp  place,  the  kind  souls  would  throw 
down  upon  it  whatever  of  their  garments  they  could 
quickest  divest  themselves  of,  that  those  feet,  little 
used  to  such  encounters,  might  receive  no  harm.  And 
as  when  other  parts  of  the  procession  were  passing  by, 
shouts  of  triumph  and  vulgar  joy  frequently  arose  from 
the  motley  crowds,  yet  when  Zenobia  appeared  a death- 
like silence  prevailed,  or  it  was  interrupted  only  by  ex- 
clamations of  admiration  or  pity,  or  of  indignation  at 
Aurelian  for  so  using  her.  But  this  happened  not  long. 
For  when  the  Emperor’s  pride  had  been  sufficiently 
gratified,  and  just  there  where  he  came  over  against 
the  steps  of  the  capitol,  he  himself,  crowned  as  he  was 
with  the  diadem  of  universal  empire,  descended  from 
his  chariot,  and  unlocking  the  chains  of  gold  that  bound 
the  limbs  of  the  Queen,  led  and  placed  her  in  her  own 
chariot — that  chariot  in  which  she  had  fondly  hoped  her- 
self to  enter  Rome  in  triumph — between  Julia  and  Livia. 
Upon  this  the  air  was  rent  with  the  grateful  acclama- 
tions of  the  countless  multitudes.  The  Queen’s  coun- 
tenance brightened  for  a moment  as  if  with  the  ex- 
pressive sentiment,  “ The  gods  bless  you ! ” and  was 
then  buried  in  the  folds  of  her  robe.  And  when  after 
the  lapse  of  many  minutes  it  was  again  raised  and 
turned  toward  the  people,  everyone  might  see  that 
tears  burning  hot  had  coursed  her  cheeks,  and  relieved 
a heart  which  else  might  well  have  burst  with  its  re- 
strained emotion. — Zenobia. 

ZENOBIA  SAVED. 

A sound  as  of  a distant  tumult,  and  the  uproar  or  a 
multitude,  caught  the  ears  of  all  within  the  tent. 

“ What  mean  these  tumultuous  cries  ?”  inquired  Aure* 


WILLIAM  WARE 


4T 


Han  of  his  attending  guard.  “ They  increase  and  ap- 
proach.’' 

“ It  may  be  but  the  soldiers  at  their  game  with  An- 
tiochus,”  replied  Probus. 

But  it  was  not  so.  At  the  moment  a Centurion, 
breathless,  and  with  his  head  bare,  rushed  madly  into 
the  tent. 

“ Speak,”  said  the  Emperor  ; “ what  is  it  ? ” 

“ The  legions  ! ” said  the  centurion,  as  soon  as  he 
could  command  his  words,  “ the  legions  are  advancing, 
crying  out  for  the  Queen  of  Palmyra ! They  have 
broken  from  their  camp  and  from  their  leaders,  and  in 
one  mixed  body  come  to  surround  the  Emperor’s  tent.” 
As  he  ended,  the  fierce  cries  of  the  enraged  soldiery 
were  distinctly  heard,  like  the  roaring  of  a forest  torn 
by  a tempest.  Aurelian,  bearing  his  sword,  and  calling 
upon  his  friends  to  do  the  same,  sprang  toward  the  en- 
trance of  the  tent.  They  were  met  by  the  dense  throng 
of  the  soldiers,  who  now  pressed  against  the  tent,  and 
whose  savage  yells  could  now  be  heard : 

“ The  head  of  Zenobia.”  “ Deliver  the  Queen  to  our 
will.”  “Throw  out  the  head  of  Zenobia,  and  we  will 
return  to  our  quarters.”  “ She  belongs  to  us.” 

At  the  same  moment  the  sides  of  the  tent  were 
thrown  up,  showing  the  whole  plain  filled  with  the  heav- 
ing multitude,  and  being  itself  instantly  crowded  with 
the  ringleaders  and  their  more  desperate  associates. 
Zenobia,  supporting  the  Princess,  who  clung  to  her,  and 
pale  through  a just  apprehension  of  every  horror,  but 
otherwise  firm  and  undaunted,  cried  out  to  Aurelian, 
“Save  us,  O Emperor,  from  this  foul  butchery!” 

“ We  will  die  else  ! ” replied  the  Emperor  ; who  with 
a word  sprang  upon  a soldier  making  toward  the  Queen, 
and  with  a blow  clove  him  to  the  earth.  Then  swing- 
ing round  him  that  sword  which  had  drunk  the  blood  of 
thousands,  and  followed  by  the  gigantic  Sandarion,  by 
Probus,  and  Carus,  a space  around  the  Queen  was  soon 
cleared. 

“Back,  ruffians,”  cried  Aurelian,  in  a voice  of  thunder, 
“for  you  are  no  longer  Romans  ! back  to  the  borders 
of  the  tent.  There  I will  hear  your  complaints.”  The 
soldiers  fell  back  and  their  ferocious  cries  ceased. 


42 


WILLIAM  WARE 


“Now,”  cried  the  Emperor,  addressing  them,  “what 
is  your  will  that  thus  in  wild  disorder  you  throng  my 
tent?” 

One  from  the  crowd  replied  : “ Our  will  is  that  the 
Queen  of  Palmyra  be  delivered  to  us  as  our  right,  in- 
stantly. Thousands  and  thousands  of  our  bold  com- 
panions lie  buried  upon  these  accursed  plains,  slain  by 
her  and  her  fiery  engines.  We  demand  her  life.  It  is 
but  justice,  and  faint  justice,  too.” 

“Her  life!”  “Her  life!”  arose  in  one  shout  from 
the  innumerable  throng. 

The  Emperor  raised  his  hand,  waving  his  sword, 
dripping  with  the  blood  of  the  slain  soldier  ; the  noise 
subsided  ; and  his  voice,  clear  and  loud  like  the  tone  of 
a trumpet,  went  to  the  farthest  bounds  of  the  multitude. 

“Soldiers,”  he  cried,  “you  ask  for  justice ; and  jus- 
tice you  shall  have.”  “Aurelian  is  ever  just!”  cried 
many  voices.  “ But  you  shall  not  have  the  life  of  the 
Queen  of  Palmyra  ” — he  paused  ; a low  murmur  went 
through  the  crowd — “ or  you  must  first  take  the  life  of 
your  Emperor,  and  of  those  who  stand  with  him.” 
The  soldiers  were  silent.  “ In  asking  the  life  of  Zeno- 
bia,”  he  continued,  “you  know  not  what  you  ask.  Are 
any  here  who  went  with  Valerian  to  the  Persian  war  ? ” 
A few  voices  responded,  “ I was  there — and  I — and  I.” 
“ Are  there  any  here  whose  parents,  or  brothers,  or 
friends,  fell  into  the  tiger  clutches  of  the*  barbarian  Sa- 
por, and  died  miserably  in  hopeless  captivity?  ” Many 
voices  everywhere  throughout  the  crowd  were  heard  in 
reply,  “Yes,  yes  ; mine  were  there,  and  mine.”  “Did 
you  ever  hear  it  said,”  continued  Aurelian,  “ that  Rome 
lifted  a finger  for  their  rescue,  or  for  that  of  the  good 
Valerian?”  They  were  silent,  some  crying,  “ No,  no.” 
“ Know  then,  that  when  Rome  forgot  her  brave  sol- 
diers and  her  Emperor,  Zenobia  remembered  and 
avenged  them  ; and  Rome,  fallen  into  contempt  with  the 
Persian,  was  raised  to  her  ancient  renown  by  the  arms 
of  her  ally,  the  brave  Zenobia,  and  her  dominions 
throughout  the  East  saved  from  the  grasp  of  Sapor 
only  by  her  valor.  While  Gallienus  wallowed  in  sensu- 
ality and  forgot  Rome,  and  even  his  own  great  father, 
the  Queen  of  Palmyra  stood  forth,  and  with  her  royal 


WILLIAM  WARE 


43 


husband,  the  noble  Odenatus,  was  in  truth  the  savior 
of  the  empire.  And  is  it  her  life  you  would  have  ? 
Were  that  a just  return  ? Were  that  Roman  magna- 
nimity ? And  grant  that  thousands  of  your  brave  com- 
panions lie  buried  upon  these  plains : it  is  but  the  fort- 
une of  war.  Were  they  not  slain  in  honorable  fight,  in 
the  siege  of  a city,  for  its  defence  unequalled  in  all  the 
annals  of  war?  Cannot  Romans  honor  courage  and 
conduct,  though  in  an  enemy?  But  you  ask  for  justice. 
I have  said  you  shall  have  justice.  You  shall.  It  is 
right  that  the  heads  and  advisers  of  this  revolt,  for  such 
the  Senate  deems  it,  should  be  cut  off.  It  is  the  min- 
isters of  princes  who  are  the  true  devisers  of  a nation’s 
acts.  These,  when  in  our  power,  shall  be  yours.  And 
now,  who,  soldiers  ! stirred  up  with  mutiny,  bringing  in- 
expiable shame  upon  our  brave  legions — who  are  the 
leaders  of  the  tumult?” 

Enough  were  found  to  name  them : 

“Firmus  ! Carinus  ! the  Centurions  Plancus  ! Tatius! 
Burrhus!  Valens!  Crispinus!” 

“ Guards  ! seize  them  and  hew  them  down.  Soldiers  ! 
to  your  tents.”  The  legions  fell  back  as  tumultuously 
as  they  had  come  together ; the  faster,  as  the  dying 
groans  of  the  slaughtered  ringleaders  fell  upon  their 
ears. 

The  tent  of  the  Emperor  was  once  more  restored  to 
order.  After  a brief  conversation,  in  which  Aurelian 
expressed  his  shame  for  the  occurrence  of  such  dis- 
orders in  the  presence  of  the  Queen,  the  guard  were 
commanded  to  convey  back  to  the  palace  of  Seleucus, 
whence  they  had  been  taken,  Zenobia  and  the  Princess. 
— . Zenobia , 


WARNER,  Charles  Dudley,  an  American 
journalist  and  miscellaneous  writer,  born  at  Plain- 
field,  Mass.,  September  12th,  1829;  died  at  Hart- 
ford, Conn.,  October  20th,  1900.  His  widowed 
mother  removed  to  Central  New  York  in  1842. 
Pie  studied  at  the  Oneida  Conference  Seminary 
at  Cazenovia,  and  entered  Plamilton  College, 
where  he  was  graduated  in  1851.  Subsequently  he 
studied  law  at  Philadelphia  in  1856,  and  practised 
his  profession  at  Chicago  until  i860.  But  the  bent 
of  his  mind  was  toward  literary  rather  than  legal 
pursuits,  and  just  before  the  breaking  out  of  the 
civil  war  he  became  assistant  editor  of  the  Evening 
Post , at  Hartford,  Conn.  This  journal  was  in 
1867  united  with  the  Hartford  Courant , of  which 
he  became  editor  and  part  proprietor.  Still  re- 
taining this  position,  he  became  in  1884  editorially 
connected  with  Harper  s Magazine.  His  principal 
works  are  : My  Summer  in  a Garden  (1870) ; Saun- 
terings , reminiscences  of  a European  trip  (1872); 
Backlog  Studies  (1872);  Baddeck  and  That  Sort  of 
Thing  (187 4) ; My  Whiter  on  the  Nile  (1876) ; In  the 
Levant  (1 87 7);  Being  a Boy  { 1877);  Life  of  Captain 
fohn  Smith  (1877);  In  the  Wilderness  (1878);  Life 
of  Washington  Irving  (1880);  Roundabout  Journey 
(1883)  ; Their  Pilgrimage  (1886) ; Book  of  Eloquence 
(1886) ; On  Horseback  (1888) ; A Little  Journey  in  the 
World  and  Studies  in  the  South  and  West  (1889); 
As  We  Were  Saying  (1892) ; As  We  Go  (1893);  The 

(44J 


C.& AXLES  DUDLE  Y WARNER 

Work  of  Washington  Irving  (1893)  ; The  Golden 
House  (1895).  In  1873  he  wrote  The  Gilded  Age , in 
conjunction  with  “ Mark  Twain,” 

THE  MORAL  QUALITIES  OF  VEGETABLES. 

! Am  more  and  more  impressed  with  the  moral  quali- 
ties of  vegetables,  and  contemplate  forming  a science 
which  will  rank  with  comparative  philology— the  science 
of  Comparative  Vegetable  Morality.  We  live  in  an  age 
of  Protoplasm,  And,  if  life-matter  is  essentially  the 
same  in  all  forms  of  life,  I propose  to  begin  early,  and 
ascertain  the  nature  of  the  plants  for  which  I am  re- 
sponsible. I will  not  associate  with  any  vegetable 
which  is  disreputable,  or  has  not  some  quality  which 
can  contribute  to  my  moral  growth.  . . 

Why  do  we  respect  some  vegetables,  and  despise 
others,  when  all  of  them  come  to  an  equal  honor  or  ig- 
nominy on  the  table  ? The  bean  is  a graceful,  confiding, 
engaging  vine  ; but  you  can  never  put  beans  into  poetry, 
nor  into  the  highest  sort  of  prose.  There  is  no  dignity 
in  the  bean.  Corn — which  in  my  garden  grows  along- 
side the  bean,  and,  so  far  as  I can  see,  with  no  affecta- 
tion of  superiority — is,  however  the  child  of  song.  It 
waves  in  all  literature.  But  ix  it  with  beans,  and  its 
high  tone  is  gone.  Succotasl  is  vulgar.  It  is  the  bean 
in  it.  The  bean  is  a vulgar  v *etable,  without  culture, 
or  any  flavor  of  high  society  among  vegetables. 

Then  there  is  the  cool  cucumber — like  so  many  peo- 
ple. good  for  nothing  when  it  is  ripe,  and  the  wildness 
has  gone  out  of  it.  How  inferior  to  the  melon,  which 
grows  upon  a similar  vine,  is  of  a like  watery  consist- 
ency, but  is  not  half  so  valuable.  The  cucumber  is  a 
sort  of  low  comedian  in  a company  where  the  melon  is 
a minor  gentleman.  I might  also  contrast  the  celery 
With  the  potato.  The  associations  are  as  opposite  as 
the  dining-room  of  the  duchess  and  the  cabin  of  the 
peasant.  I admire  the  potato  both  in  vine  and  blos- 
som ; but  it  is  not  aristocratic.  . . . 

The  lettuce  is  to  me  a most  interesting  study.  Let- 
tuce is  like  conversation  • it  must  be  fresh  and  crisp,  so 


46 


CHARLES  DUDLEY  WARNER 


sparkling  that  you  scarcely  notice  the  bitter  in  it.  Let- 
tuce, like  most  talkers,  is  however  apt  to  run  rapidly  to 
seed.  Blessed  is  that  sort  which  comes  to  a head,  and 
so  remains — like  a few  people  I know — growing  more 
solid  and  satisfactory  and  tender  at  the  same  time,  and 
whiter  at  the  centre,  and  crisp  in  their  maturity.  Let- 
tuce, like  conversation,  requires  a good  deal  of  oil,  to 
avoid  friction,  and  keep  the  company  smooth ; a pinch 
of  Attic  salt,  a dash  of  pepper,  a quantity  of  mustard 
and  vinegar,  by  all  means — but  so  mixed  that  you  will 
notice  no  sharp  contrasts — and  a trifle  of  sugar.  You 
can  put  anything — and  the  more  things  the  better — into 
salad,  as  into  conversation  ; but  everything  depends 
upon  the  skill  in  mixing.  I feel  that  I am  in  the  best 
society  when  I am  with  lettuce.  Tt  is  in  the  select 
circle  of  vegetables.  The  tomato  appears  well  on  the 
table ; but  you  do  not  want  to  ask  its  origin.  It  is  a 
most  agreeable  parvenu. 

Of  course,  I have  said  nothing  about  the  berries. 
They  live  in  another  and  more  ideal  region  ; except 
perhaps  the  currant.  Here  we  see  that  even  among 
berries  there  are  degrees  of  breeding.  The  currant  is 
well  enough,  clear  as  truth,  and  exquisite  in  color ; but 
I ask  you  to  notice  how  far  it  is  from  the  exclusive 
hauteur  of  the  aristocratic  strawberry,  and  the  native 
refinement  of  the  quietly  elegant  raspberry. 

I do  not  know  that  chemistry,  searching  for  proto- 
plasm, is  able  to  discover  the  tendency  of  vegetables. 
It  can  only  be  found  out  by  outward  observation.  I 
confess  that  I am  suspicious  of  the  bean,  for  instance. 
There  are  signs  in  it  of  an  unregulated  life.  I put  up 
the  most  attractive  sort  of  poles  for  my  Limas.  They 
stand  high  and  straight  like  church-spires,  in  my  theo- 
logical garden — lifted  up  ; and  some  of  them  have  even 
budded,  like  Aaron’s  rod.  No  church-steeple  in  a New 
England  village  was  ever  better  fitted  to  draw  to  it  the 
rising  generation  on  Sunday  than  those  poles  to  lift  up 
my  beans  toward  heaven.  Some  of  them  did  run  up 
the  sticks  seven  feet,  and  then  straggled  off  into  the  air 
in  a wanton  manner  ; but  more  than  half  of  them  went 
gallivanting  off  to  the  neighboring  grape-trellis,  and 
wound  their  tendrils  with  the  tendrils  of  the  grape,  with 


CHARLES  DUDLEY  WARNER 


47 


a disregard  of  the  proprieties  of  life  which  is  a satire 
upon  human  nature.  And  the  grape  is  morally  no  bet- 
ter. I think  the  ancients,  who  were  not  troubled  with 
the  recondite  mysteries  of  protoplasm,  were  right  in  the 
mythic  union  of  Bacchus  and  Venus. 

Talk  about  the  Darwinian  theory  of  development,  and 
the  principle  of  natural  selection  ! I should  like  to  see 
a garden  let  to  run  in  accordance  with  it.  If  I had  left 
my  vegetables  and  weeds  to  a free  fight,  in  which  the 
strongest  specimens  only  should  come  to  maturity,  and 
the  weaker  go  to  the  wall,  I can  clearly  see  that  I should 
have  had  a pretty  mess  of  it.  It  would  have  been  a 
scene  of  passion  and  license  and  brutality.  The  “ pus- 
ley  ” would  have  strangled  the  strawberry  ; the  upright 
corn,  which  has  now  ears  to  hear  the  guilty  beating  of 
the  hearts  of  the  children  who  steal  the  raspberries, 
would  have  been  dragged  to  the  earth  by  the  wander- 
ing bean  ; the  snake-grass  would  have  left  no  place  for 
the  potatoes  under  ground  ; and  the  tomatoes  would 
have  been  swamped  by  the  lusty  weeds.  With  a firm 
hand  I have  had  to  make  my  own  “ natural  selection.” 

Nothing  will  so  well  bear  watching  as  a garden,  ex- 
cept a family  of  children  next  door.  Their  power  of 
selection  beats  mine.  If  they  could  read  half  as  well  as 
they  can  “ steal  awhile  away,”  I should  have  put  up  a 
notice  — “ Children,  beware  ! There  is  Protoplasm 
here  ! ” But  I suppose  it  would  have  no  effect.  I be- 
lieve that  they  would  eat  protoplasm  as  quick  as  any- 
thing else,  ripe  or  green.  I wonder  if  this  is  going  to 
be  a cholera-year.  Considerable  cholera  is  the  only 
thing  that  would  let  my  apples  and  pears  ripen.  Of 
course,  I do  not  care  for  the  fruit ; but  I do  not  want  to 
take  the  responsibility  of  letting  so  much  “ life-matter,” 
full  of  crude  and  even  disreputable  vegetable-human 
tendencies  pass  into  the  composition  of  the  neighbor’s 
children,  some  of  whom  may  be  as  immortal  as  snake- 
grass. — My  Summer  in  a Garden . 

A COMMERCIAL  TRANSACTION  IN  ORANGES. 

One  of  our  expeditions  illustrates  the  Italian  love  of 
bargaining,  and  their  notion  of  a sliding  scale  of  prices. 


CHARLES  DUDLEY  WARNER 


48 

One  of  our  expeditions  to  the  hills  was  making  its  long, 
straggling  way  through  the  narrow  streets  of  a little 
village,  when  I lingered  behind  my  companions,  attracted 
by  a hand-cart  with  several  large  baskets  of  oranges. 
The  cart  stood  in  >'ie  middle  of  the  street ; and  select- 
ing a large  orange,  which  would  measure  twelve  inches 
in  circumference,  I turned  to  look  for  the  owner.  After 
some  time  the  fellow  got  from  the  neighboring  cobbler’s 
shop,  where  he  sat  with  his  lazy  cronies,  listening  to  the 
honest  gossip  of  the  follower  of  St.  Crispin,  and  saun- 
tered toward  me. 

“ How  much  for  this  ? ” I ask. 

“ One  franc,  Signor,”  says  the  proprietor,  with  a polite 
bow,  holding  up  one  finger. 

I shake  my  head,  and  intimate  that  this  is  altogether 
too  much.  The  proprietor  is  very  indifferent,  and 
shrugs  his  shoulders  in  an  amiable  manner.  He  picks 
up  a fair,  handsome  orange,  weighs  it  in  his  hands,  and 
holds  it  up  temptingly.  That  also  is  one  franc.  I sug- 
gest one  sou  as  a fair  price — a suggestion  which  he  only 
receives  with  a smile  of  slight  pity,  and,  I fancy,  a little 
disdain.  A woman  joins  him,  and  also  holds  up  this  and 
that  gold-skinned  one  for  my  admiration. 

As  I stand  sorting  over  the  fruit,  trying  to  please  my- 
self with  the  size,  color,  and  texture,  a little  crowd  has 
gathered  round  ; and  I see  by  a glance  that  all  the  occu- 
pations in  that  neighborhood,  including  loafing,  are 
temporarily  suspended  to  witness  the  trade.  The  in- 
terest of  the  circle  visibly  increases  ; and  others  take 
such  a part  in  the  transaction,  that  I begin  to  doubt  if 
the  first  man  is,  after  all,  the  proprietor. 

At  length  I select  two  oranges,  and  again  demand  the 
price.  There  is  a little  consultation  and  jabber,  when 
I am  told  that  I can  have  both  for  a franc.  I,  in  turn, 
sigh,  shrug  my  shoulders,  and  put  down  the  oranges 
amid  a chorus  of  exclamations  over  my  graspingness. 
My  offer  of  two  sous  is  met  with  ridicule,  but  not  with 
indifference.  I can  see  that  it  has  made  a sensation. 
These  simple,  idle  children  of  the  sun  begin  to  show  a 
little  excitement.  I at  length  determine  upon  a bold 
stroke,  and  resolve  to  show  myself  the  Napoleon  of  or- 
anges, or  to  meet  my  Waterloo.  I pick  out  four  of  the 


CHARLES  DUDLEY  WARNER 


49 


largest  oranges  in  the  basket,  while  all  eyes  are  fixed 
upon  me  intently,  and  for  the  first  time  pull  out  a piece 
of  money.  It  is  a two-sous  piece.  I offer  it  for  the 
four  oranges. 

“ No,  no,  no,  Signor  I Ah,  Signor  ! Ah,  Signor  I ” in  a 
chorus  from  the  whole  crowd. 

I have  struck  bottom  at  last,  and  perhaps  got  some- 
where near  the  value  ; and  all  calmness  is  gone.  Such 
protestations,  such  indignation,  such  sorrow,  I have 
never  seen  before  from  so  small  a cause.  “ It  cannot 
be  thought  of  ! It  is  mere  ruin  ! ” I am,  in  turn,  as 
firm,  and  nearly  as  excited  in  seeming.  I hold  up  the 
fruit,  and  tender  the  money. 

“ No,  never,  never  ! The  Signor  cannot  be  in  earnest ! ” 

Looking  round  me  for  a moment,  and  assuming  a 
theatrical  manner  befitting  the  gestures  of  those  about 
me,  I fling  the  fruit  down,  and  with  a sublime  renuncia- 
tion stalk  away.  There  is  instantly  a buzz  and  a clamor. 
I have  not  proceeded  far  when  a skinny  old  woman  runs 
after  me  and  begs  me  to  return.  I go  back,  and  the 
crowd  parts  to  receive  me. 

The  proprietor  has  a new  proposition,  the  effect  of 
which  upon  me  is  intently  watched.  He  proposes  to 
give  me  five  big  oranges  for  four  sous.  I receive  it  with 
utter  scorn,  and  a laugh  of  derision.  I will  give  two 
sous  for  the  original  four  and  not  a centissimo  more. 
That  I solemnly  say,  and  am  ready  to  depart.  Hesita- 
tion, and  renewed  conference  ; but  at  last  the  proprietor 
relents  ; and,  with  the  look  of  one  who  is  ruined  for 
life,  and  who  yet  is  willing  to  sacrifice  himself,  he  hands 
me  the  oranges.  Instantly  the  excitement  is  dead;  the 
crowd  disperses  ; and  the  street  is  as  quiet  as  ever  when 
I walk  away,  bearing  my  hard-won  treasures. 

A little  while  after,  as  I sat  upon  the  Camaldoli,  with 
my  feet  hanging  over,  these  same  oranges  were  taken 
from  my  pockets  by  Americans  ; so  that  I am  prevented 
from  making  any  moral  reflections  upon  the  honesty  of 
the  Italians. — Saunterings. 

A YANKEE  PHILOSOPHER. 

I confess  that  I have  a soft  place  in  my  heart  for  that 
rare  character  in  our  New  England  life  who  is  content 


50 


CHARLES  DUl>x.EY  WARNER 


with  the  world  as  he  finds  it ; and  who  does  not  at- 
tempt to  appropriate  any  more  of  it  to  himself  than  he 
absolutely  needs  from  day  to  day.  He  knows  from  the 
beginning  that  the  world  could  get  on  without  him,  and 
he  has  never  had  any  anxiety  to  leave  any  result  behind 
him — any  legacy  for  the  world  to  quarrel  over.  He  is 
really  an  exotic  in  our  New  England  climate  and  so- 
ciety ; and  his  life  is  perpetually  misunderstood  by  his 
neighbors,  because  he  shares  none  of  their  anxiety 
about  “ getting  on  in  life.”  He  is  even  called  “ lazy,” 
“ good-for-nothing,”  and  “shiftless” — the  final  stigma 
that  we  put  upon  a person  who  has  learned  to  wait 
without  the  exhausting  process  of  laboring. 

I made  his  acquaintance  last  summer  in  the  country ; 
and  I have  not  for  a long  time  been  so  well  pleased  with 
any  of  our  species.  He  had  always  been  from  boyhood 
of  a contented  and  placid  mind  ; slow  in  his  movements, 
slow  in  his  speech.  I think  he  never  cherished  a hard 
feeling  toward  anybody,  nor  envied  anyone — least  of 
all  the  rich  and  prosperous,  about  whom  he  liked  to 
talk.  Indeed,  his  talk  was  a good  deal  about  wealth, 
especially  about  his  cousin  who  had  been  down  South, 
and  “ got  fore-handed  ” within  a few  years.  But  he  had 
no  envy  in  him,  and  he  evinced  no  desire  to  imitate  him. 
I inferred  from  all  his  conversation  about  “ piling  it 
up  ” (of  which  he  spoke  with  a gleam  of  enthusiasm  in 
his  eye),  that  there  were  moments  when  he  would  like 
to  be  rich  himself ; but  it  was  evident  that  he  would 
never  make  the  least  effort  to  be  so  ; and  I doubt  if  he 
could  even  overcome  that  delicious  inertia  of  mind  and 
body  called  laziness,  sufficiently  to  inherit. 

Wealth  seemed  to  have  a far  and  peculiar  fascination 
for  him ; and  I suspect  he  was  a visionary  in  the  midst 
of  his  poverty.  Yet  I suppose  he  had  hardly  the  per- 
sonal property  which  the  law  exempts  from  execution. 
He  had  lived  in  a great  many  towns,  moving  from  one 
to  another  with  his  growing  family  by  easy  stages,  and 
was  always  the  poorest  man  in  the  town,  and  lived  on 
the  most  niggardly  of  its  rocky  and  bramble-grown 
farms,  the  productiveness  of  which  he  reduced  to  zero 
in  a couple  of  years  by  his  careful  neglect  of  culture. 
The  fences  of  his  hired  domain  always  fell  into  ruins  un* 


CHARLES  DUDLEY  WARNER 


S* 

der  him,  perhaps  because  he  sat  upon  them  so  much  . 
and  the  hovels  he  occupied  rotted  down  during  his 
placid  residence  in  them.  He  moved  from  desolation 
to  desolation  ; but  carried  always  with  him  the  equal 
mind  of  a philosopher.  Not  even  the  occasional  tart 
remarks  of  his  wife  about  their  nomadic  life,  and  his 
serenity  in  the  midst  of  discomfort,  could  ruffle  his 
smooth  spirit. 

He  was  in  every  respect  a most  worthy  man  ; truth- 
ful, honest,  temperate,  and,  I need  not  say,  frugal.  He 
had  no  bad  habits  ; perhaps  he  never  had  energy  enough 
to  acquire  any.  Nor  did  he  lack  the  knack  of  the  Yan- 
kee race.  He  could  make  a shoe,  or  build  a house,  or 
doctor  a cow  ; but  it  never  seemed  to  him,  in  this  brief 
existence,  worth  the  while  to  do  any  of  these  things. 
He  was  an  excellent  angler,  but  he  rarely  fished  ; partly 
because  of  the  shortness  of  the  days,  partly  on  account 
of  the  uncertainty  of  bites,  but  principally  because  the 
trout-brooks  were  all  arranged  lengthwise,  and  ran  over 
so  much  ground.  But  no  man  liked  to  look  at  a string 
of  trout  better  than  he  did  ; and  he  was  willing  to  sit 
down  in  a sunny  place  and  talk  about  trout-fishing  half 
a day  at  a time  ; and  he  would  talk  pleasantly  and  well, 
too,  though  his  wife  might  be  continually  interrupting 
him  by  a call  for  firewood. 

I should  not  do  justice  to  his  own  idea  of  himself  if  I 
did  not  add  that  he  was  most  respectably  connected, 
and  that  he  had  a justifiable  though  feeble  pride  in  his 
family.  It  helped  his  self-respect,  which  no  ignoble 
circumstance  could  destroy.  He  was — as  must  appear 
by  this  time — a most  intelligent  man,  and  he  was  a well- 
informed  man.  That  is  to  say,  he  read  the  weekly 
newspapers  when  he  could  get  them  ; and  he  had  the 
average  country  information  about  Beecher,  and  Gree- 
ley, and  the  Prussian  war  (“  Napoleon  is  giftin’  on’t, 
ain’t  he  ”)  and  the  general  prospect  of  the  election  cam- 
paigns. Indeed,  he  was  warmly — or,  rather,  lukewarmly 
— interested  in  politics.  He  liked  to  talk  about  the 
“ inflated  currency  *’ ; and  it  seemed  plain  to  him  that 
his  condition  would  somehow  be  improved  if  we  could 
get  to  a “ specie  basis.”  He  was,  in  fact,  a little 
troubled  about  the  National  Debt ; it  seemed  to  pre^s 
V ou  XXIY-f  - 


52 


CHARLES  DUDLEY  WARNER 


on  him  somehow,  while  his  own  never  did.  He  exhib* 
ited  more  animation  over  the  affairs  of  the  government 
than  he  did  over  his  own — an  evidence  at  once  of  hit 
disinterestedness  and  his  patriotism. 

He  had  been  an  old  Abolitionist,  and  was  strong  on 
the  rights  of  “ free  labor  ” ; though  he  did  not  care  to 
exercise  his  privilege  much.  Of  course  he  had  the 
proper  contempt  for  the  “ poor  whites M down  South. 
I never  saw  a person  with  more  correct  notions  on  such 
a variety  of  subjects.  He  was  perfectly  willing  that 
churches  (being  himself  a member),  and  Sunday-schools, 
and  missionary  enterprises  should  go  on.  In  fact,  I do 
not  believe  he  ever  opposed  anything  in  his  life.  No 
one  was  more  willing  to  vote  town-taxes  and  road- 
vepairs  and  school-house  than  he.  If  you  could  call  him 
spirited  at  all,  he  was  public-spirited. 

And  with  all  this,  he  was  never  “ very  well”;  he  had 
from  boyhood  “ enjoyed  poor  health.0  You  would  say 
he  was  not  a man  who  would  ever  catch  anything — not 
even  an  epidemic  ; but  he  was  a person  whom  diseases 
would  be  likely  to  overtake — even  the  slowest  of  slow 
fevers.  And  he  wasn’t  a man  to  shake  off  anything. 
And  yet  sickness  seemed  to  trouble  him  no  more  than 
poverty.  He  was  not  discontented  ; he  never  grumbled. 
I am  not  sure  but  that  he  relished  a “ spell  of  sickness  ** 
in  haying-time. 

An  admirably  balanced  man,  who  accepts  the  world 
as  it  is,  and  evidently  lives  on  the  experience  of  others. 
I have  never  seen  a man  with  less  envy  or  more  cheer- 
fulness, or  so  contented,  with  as  little  reason  for  being 
so.  The  only  drawback  to  his  future  is  that  rest  be- 
yond the  grave  will  not  be  much  change  for  him,  and  ho 
has  no  works  to  follow  him. — Backlog  Studies, 


WARNER,  Susan,  an  American  novelist,  born 
in  New  York,  July  11,  1819;  died  at  Highland 
Falls,  near  West  Point,  N.  Y.,  March  17,  1885. 
Her  first  novel,  The  Wide , Wide  World , was  pub- 
lished in  1851,  under  the  pseudonym  of  “ Eliza- 
beth Wetherell.”  Her  other  works  are  Quee - 
chy  (1852);  The  Law  and  the  Testimony  (1853);  The 
Hills  of  the  Shatemuc  (1856) ; The  Old  Helmet  (1863) ; 
Melbourne  House  (1864) ; Daisy  (1868) ; A Story  of 
Small  Beginnings  (1872);  the  Say  and  Do  series 
(1875) ; Diana  (1876) ; My  Desire  (1877)  ; The  Broken 
Walls  of  ferusalem  ( 1 878) ; The  Kingdom  of  Judah 
(1878);  The  End  of  a Coil  (1880);  The  Letter  of 
Credit  (1881);  Stephen , M.D.  (1883).  In  conjunc- 
tion with  her  sister  she  wrote  Say  and  Seal  (i860); 
Ellen  Montgomery  s Book-Shelf  (1863-69);  Books 
of  Blessing  ( 1 868) ; Wych-Hazel  ( 1 876). 

Her  sister,  Anna  Bartlett  Warner,  born  at 
New  York  in  1820,  has  written  much  under  the 
pseudonym  of  “Amy  Lothrop.”  Besides  the 
works  written  in  conjunction  with  her  sister,  Su- 
san Warner,  she  is  the  author  of  several  novels, 
and  many  works  designed  for  juvenile  readers. 
Among  these  are  Dollars  and  Cents  (1853);  My 
Brother  s Keeper  (1855) ; Three  Little  Spades  (1870); 
Stories  of  Vinegar  Hill  (1871);  The  Fourth  Watch 
(1872);  Gardening  by  Myself  { 1872);  The  Other 
Shore  (1873);  Miss  Tiller's  Vegetable  Garden  (1875); 

(53) 


54 


SUSAN  WARNER 


A Bag  of  Stories  (1883) ; Daisy  Plains  { 1886) ; Cross 
Corners  (1887) ; Patience  ( 1891);  Up  and  Down  the 
House  (1892),  and  several  volumes  of  poems. 

AUTUMN  NUTS  AND  LEAVES. 

In  a hollow,  rather  a deep  hollow — behind  the  crest 
of  the  hill,  as  Fleda  had  said,  they  came  at  last  to  a 
noble  group  of  large  hickory-trees,  with  one  or  two 
chestnuts  standing  in  attendance  on  the  outskirts ; and 
also,  as  Fleda  had  said,  or  hoped,  the  place  was  so  far 
from  convenient  access  that  nobody  had  visited  them  ; 
they  were  thick  hung  with  fruit.  If  the  spirit  of  the 
game  had  been  wanting  or  failing  in  Mr.  Carleton,  it 
must  have  been  roused  again  into  full  life  at  the  joyous 
heartiness  of  Fleda’s  exclamations.  At  any  rate,  no  boy 
could  have  taken  to  the  business  better.  He  cut,  with 
her  permission,  a long,  stout  pole  in  the  woods  ; and 
swinging  himself  lightly  into  one  of  the  trees,  showed 
that  he  was  master  of  the  art  of  whipping  them.  Fleda 
was  delighted,  but  not  surprised  ; for  from  the  first  mo- 
ment of  Mr.  Carleton’s  proposing  to  go  with  her  she  had 
been  privately  sure  that  he  would  not  prove  an  inactive 
or  inefficient  ally.  By  whatever  slight  tokens  she  might 
read  this,  in  whatever  fine  characters  of  the  eye  or  speech 
or  manner,  she  knew  it ; and  knew  it  just  as  well  before 
they  reached  the  hickory-trees  as  she  did  afterward. 

When  one  of  the  trees  was  well  stripped,  the  young 
gentleman  mounted  into  another,  while  Fleda  set  her- 
self to  hull  and  gather  up  the  nuts  under  the  one  first 
beaten.  She  could  make  but  little  headway,  however, 
compared  with  her  companion  ; the  nuts  fell  a great 
deal  faster  than  she  could  put  them  in  her  basket.  The 
trees  were  heavy  laden,  and  Mr.  Carleton  seemed  de- 
termined to  have  the  whole  crop  ; from  the  second  tree 
he  went  to  the  third.  Fleda  was  bewildered  with  her 
happiness  ; this  was  doing  business  in  style.  She  tried 
to  calculate  what  the  whole  quantity  would  be,  but  it 
went  beyond  her;  one  basketful  would  not  take  it,  nor 
two,  nor  three.  “ It  wouldn’t  begin  to,”  said  Fleda  to 
herself.  She  went  on  hulling  and  gathering  with  ail 
possible  industry. 


SUSAN  WARNER 


55 


After  the  third  tree  was  finished,  Mr.  Carleton  threw 
down  his  pole,  and  resting  himself  upon  the  ground  at 
the  foot,  told  Fleda  he  would  wait  a few  moments  before 
he  began  again.  Fleda  thereupon  left  off  her  work,  too, 
and  going  for  her  little  tin  pail  presently  offered  it  to 
him,  temptingly  stocked  with  pieces  of  apple-pie.  When 
he  had  smilingly  taken  one,  she  next  brought  him  a 
sheet  of  white  paper  with  slices  of  young  cheese. 

“ No,  thank  you,”  said  he. 

“ Cheese  is  very  good  with  apple-pie,”  said  Fleda, 
competently. 

“ Is  it?”  said  he,  laughing.  “Well,  upon  that,  I 
think  you  would  teach  me  a good  many  things,  Miss 
Fleda,  if  I were  to  stay  here  long  enough.” 

“ I wish  you  would  stay  and  try,  sir,”  said  Fleda,  who 
did  not  know  exactly  what  to  make  of  the  shade  of 
seriousness  which  crossed  his  face.  It  was  gone  almost 
instantly. 

“ I think  anything  is  better  eaten  out  in  the  woods 
than  it  is  at  home,”  said  Fleda. 

“Well,  I don’t  know,”  said  her  friend.  “I  have  no 
doubt  that  this  is  the  case  with  cheese  and  apple-pie, 
and  especially  under  hickory-trees  which  one  has  been 
contending  with  pretty  sharply.  If  a touch  of  your 
wand,  Fairy,  could  transform  one  of  these  shells  into  a 
goblet  of  Lafitte  or  Amontillado  we  should  have  nothing 
to  wish  for.” 

“ Amontillado  ” was  unintelligible  to  Fleda,  but  “ gob- 
let ” was  intelligible. 

“ I am  sorry,”  she  said,  “ I don’t  know  where  there  is 
any  spring  up  here  ; but  we  shall  come  to  one  going 
down  the  mountain.” 

“ Do  you  know  where  all  the  springs  are  ? ” 

“ No,  not  all,  I suppose,”  said  Fleda,  “ but  I know  a 
good  many.  I have  gone  about  through  the  woods  so 
much,  and  I always  look  for  the  springs.”  . . . 

They  descended  the  mountain  now  with  hasty  step, 
for  the  day  was  wearing  well  on.  At  the  spot  where 
he  had  stood  so  long  when  they  went  up,  Mr.  Carleton 
paused  again  for  a minute.  In  mountain  scenery  every 
hour  makes  a change.  The  sun  was  lower  now,  and 
the  lights  and  shadows  more  strongly  contrasted  ; the 


SUSAN  WARNER 


& 

sky  of  a yet  calmer  blue,  cool  and  clear  toward  the 
horizon,  The  scene  said  still  the  same  thing  it  had  said 
a few  hours  before,  with  a touch  more  of  sadness  ; it 
seemed  to  whisper,  “ All  things  have  an  end  ; thy  time 
may  not  be  forever  ; do  what  thou  wouldst  do ; ‘ while 
ye  have  light,  believe  in  the  light  that  ye  may  be  chil- 
dren of  the  light.’  ” 

Whether  Mr.  Carleton  read  it  so  or  not,  he  stood  for 
a minute  motionless,  and  went  down  the  mountain  look- 
ing so  grave  that  Fleda  did  not  venture  to  speak  to  him 
till  they  reached  the  neighborhood  of  the  spring. 

“What  are  you  searching  for,  Miss  Fleda?”  said  her 
friend. 

She  was  making  a busy  quest  here  and  there  by  the 
side  of  the  little  stream. 

“ I was  looking  to  see  if  I could  find  a mullein-leaf,” 
said  Fleda. 

“ A mullein-leaf  ? What  do  you  want  it  for  ? ” 

“I  want  it  to  make  a drinking-cup  of,”  said  Fleda, 
her  intent  bright  eyes  peering  keenly  about  in  every 
direction. 

“ A mullein-leaf ! that  is  too  rough ; one  of  these 
golden  leaves — what  are  they — will  do  better,  won’t 
it?” 

“That  is  hickory,”  said  Fleda.  “No;  the  mullein- 
leaf  is  the  best,  because  it  holds  the  water  so  nicely. 
Here  it  is.” 

And  folding  up  one  of  the  largest  leaves  into  a most 
artist-like  cup,  she  presented  it  to  Mr.  Carleton. 

“ For  me  was  all  that  trouble  ? ” said  he.  “ I don't  de- 
serve it.” 

“You  wanted  something,  sir,”  said  Fleda.  “The  wa- 
ter is  very  cold  and  nice.” 

He  stooped  to  the  bright  little  stream,  and  filled  his 
rural  goblet  several  times. 

“ I never  knew  what  it  was  to  have  a Fairy  for  my 
cup-bearer  before,”  said  he.  “ That  was  better  than 
anything  Bordeaux  or  Xeres  ever  sent  forth.” 

He  seemed  to  have  swallowed  his  seriousness,  or 
thrown  it  away  with  the  mullein-leaf. 

“ This  is  the  best  spring  in  all  grandpa’s  ground,”  said 
Fleda.  “ The  water  is  as  good  as  can  be.” 


SC/S A AT  WARMER 


57 


“ How  came  you  to  be  such  a wood  and  water  spirit  ? 
You  must  live  out  of  doors.  Do  the  trees  ever  talk  to 
you  ? I sometimes  think  they  do  to  me.” 

“ I don’t  know.  I think  I talk  to  them,”  said  Fleda. 

“ It’s  the  same  thing,”  said  her  companion,  smiling. 
“ Such  beautiful  woods  ! ” 

“ Were  you  never  in  the  country  in  the  fall,  sir  ? ” 
“Not  here;  in  my  own  country  often  enough.  But 
the  woods  in  England  do  not  put  on  such  a gay  face, 
Miss  Fleda,  when  they  are  going  to  be  stripped  of  their 
summer  dress  ; they  look  sober  upon  it ; the  leaves 
wither  and  grow  brown  and  the  woods  have  a dull  russet 
color.  Your  trees  are  true  Yankees — they  i never  say 
die  ! ' ” — Queechy, 


THE  FLOWER  GIFTS. 

Nothing  had  been  heard  of  little  Dick’s  garden  for 
some  time,  and  though  Clover  had  been  very  anxious  to 
see  it,  she  had  not  dared  to  say  a word.  But  one  day, 
after  the  dry  weather  had  passed  by,  and  the  showers 
had  come  to  make  everything  look  fresh,  Sam  proposed 
that  they  should  take  a walk  that  way,  and  see  Dick’s 
balsams. 

“ We’ll  see  if  they  look  like  yours,  Clover,”  said  little 
Primrose. 

“ But  has  Dick  got  any  heart’s-ease,  Sam  ? ” said  little 
Primrose. 

“ I think  not.” 

“ Then  I’d  better  take  him  some,”  said  Prim,  with  a 
very  grave  face. 

“ But  you’ll  kill  the  plants,  dear,  if  you  take  them  up 
now,  when  they  are  all  full  of.  flowers,”  said  Clover ; 
“ or  at  least  kill  the  flowers.” 

“ It’s  only  the  flowers  I mean  to  take,”  replied  Prim- 
rose, as  gravely  as  before.  “ I’ll  take  Dick  a bunch  of 
’em.” 

“ What’s  that  for  ? ” said  Sam,  putting  his  hand  un- 
der her  chin,  and  bringing  her  little  sober  face  into 
view. 

“ Because,”  said  Prim,  “ I’ve  been  thinking  about  it  a 
jpreat  deal — about  what  mamma  said.  And  if  Cxod  asked 


SUSAN  WARNER 


& 

me  what  I had  done  with  my  heart’s-ease,  I shouldn*t 
like  to  say  I’d  never  given  Dick  one.” 

“Oh,  if  that’s  all,”  said  Lily,  “I  can  pick  him  a great 
bunch  of  petunias.  Do  ’em  good,  too — they  want  cut- 
ting.” 

While  Lily  flew  down  to  her  garden  and  began  to  pull 
off  the  petunias  with  an  unsparing  hand,  Primrose 
crouched  down  by  her  patch  of  heart’s-ease,  carefully 
cutting  one  of  each  shade  and  tint  that  she  could  find, 
putting  them  lovingly  together,  with  quite  an  artistic 
arrangement  of  colors. 

“ Exquisite  ! ” said  Sam,  watching  her.  Prim  started 
up  and  smiled. 

“ Dear  me,  how  splendid  ! ” said  Lily,  running  up, 
with  her  hands  full  of  petunias  ; “ but  just  look  at  these  ! 
What  will  you  take,  Clover  ? ” 

“ I think — I shall  not  take  anything,”  said  Clover, 
slowly. 

“ Nothing ! out  of  all  your  garden 1 ” saitf  Lily. 
Clover  flushed  crimson. 

“ I’m  not  sure  that  Dick  would  care  to  have  me  bring 
any  of  my  flowers,”  she  said,  in  a low  voice.  “ Maybe  I 
can  find ” And  she  hurried  off,  coming  back  pres- 

ently with  a half-open  rosebud,  which  she  quietly  put  in 
Prim’s  hand,  to  go  with  the  heart’s-ease.  Then  they 
set  off. 

Dick,  of  course,  was  in  his  garden — he  was  always 
there  when  it  did  not  rain,  and  sometimes  when  it  did  ; 
and  visitors  were  a particularly  pleasant  thing  to  him 
now  that  he  had  flowers  to  show.  He  welcomed  them 
very  joyfully,  beginning  at  once  to  display  his  treas- 
ures. Great  was  the  surprise  of  Lily  and  Primrose  to 
see  the  very  same  flowers  in  Dick’s  garden  that  there 
were  in  Clover’s — the  beautiful  camelia-flowered  balsams 
and  the  graceful  amaranths  and  the  showy  zinnias  ; 
even  a canary-vine  was  there,  fluttering  over  the  fence. 

“ But  where  did  you  get  them  all  ? ” cried  Lily. 

“ A lady,”  said  Dick.  “ She’s  a good  one  ; and  that’s 
all  I know.” 

“ Where  does  she  live  ? ” inquired  Sam. 

“Don’t  know,  sir,”  said  Dick.  “Nobody  didn’t  tell 
me  that.  Man  that  fetched  ’em — that’s  the  seeds  and 


SUSAN  WARNER 


59 

little  green  things — he  said,  says  he, * These  be  out  of 
the  young  lady’s  own  garden,’  says  he.” 

“Young  lady!  ” said  Lily.  “Oh,  I dare  say  it  was 
Maria  Jarvis.  You  know,  Clover,  she’s  got  such  loads 
of  flowers  in  her  garden,  and  a man  to  take  care  of  ’em 
and  all.” 

But  Clover  did  not  answer,  and  seemed  rather  in 
haste  to  get  away,  opening  the  little  gate,  and  stepping 
out  upon  the  road,  and  when  Sam  looked  at  her  he  saw 
that  she  was  biting  her  lips  very  hard  to  keep  from 
laughing.  It  must  have  pleased  him — Clover’s  face,  or 
the  laughing,  or  the  flowers,  or  something — for  the 
first  thing  he  did  when  they  were  all  outside  the  gate 
was  to  put  his  arm  around  Clover  and  give  her  a good 
hearty  kiss.  Little  Prim  all  this  while  had  said  scarce- 
ly a word,  looking  on  with  all  her  eyes,  as  we  say.  But 
when  Prim  was  going  to  bed  that  night,  and  Mrs.  May 
bent  over  her  for  a parting  embrace,  Prim  said  : 

“ Mamma,  I don’t  think  God  will  ever  ask  Clover 
what  she’s  done  with  her  flowers.” 

“ Why  not  ?”  asked  her  mother. 

“Because,”  answered  Primrose,  sedately,  “ I think  He 
told  her  what  to  do  with  ’em — and  I think  she’s  done 
it.” — Three  Little  Spaces 


■ ; V 


WARREN,  Samuel,  an  English  jurist,  novel- 
ist,  and  miscellaneous  writer,  born  in  Denbigh- 
shire, Wales,  May  23,  1807;  died  in  London,  July 
29,  1877.  He  began  the  study  of  medicine  in 
Edinburgh,  but  entered  Lincoln’s  Inn,  London,  as 
a student  of  law ; was  called  to  the  bar  in  1837, 
and  made  a queen’s  counsel  in  1851.  In  1854  he 
became  Recorder  of  Hull,  retaining  that  position 
until  1874.  In  1856  he  was  returned  to  Parliament 
for  Medhurst,  but  resigned  his  seat  in  1859  upon 
accepting  the  appointment  of  one  of  the  two  Mas- 
ters in  Lunacy.  His  first  notable  work  was  the 
Passages  from  the  Diary  of  a Late  Physician , which 
appeared  in  Blackwood's  Magazine  in  1830-31. 
These  narratives  were  told  with  such  apparent 
verisimilitude  that  they  were  generally  supposed 
to  be  records  of  the  actual  experience  of  the  au- 
thor, and  it  is  not  easy  to  believe  but  that  some  of 
them  at  least  had  a foundation  in  fact.  They  cer- 
tainly bear  traces  of  the  early  medical  studies 
of  the  young  lawyer,  and  are  of  higher  value 
than  any  of  his  later  writings.  The  long  novel, 
Ten  Thousand  a Year  (1839),  contains  many  strik- 
ing delineations  of  legal  and  aristocratic  life, 
but  is  marred  by  broad  caricature  of  the  lower 
classes.  The  shorter  novel,  Now  and  Then  (1847), 
on  which  he  prided  himselt,  met  with  less  favor 
than  it  deserved,  and  was  his  last  work  of  fiction. 
(6d) 


SAMUEL  WARE  EM 


St 


In  1851,  upon  occasion  of  the  great  exhibition  in 
London,  he  put  forth  a rhapsodical  apologue,  The 
Lily  and  the  Bee , of  very  slight  merit.  He  also 
published  at  various  times  many  works  upon  legal 
and  social  topics.  Among  these  are  Introduction 
to  Law  Studies  (1835);  an  annotated  edition  of  a 
portion  of  Blackstone's  Commentaries  (1836);  The 
Opium  Question  (1840) ; Moral , Social  and  Profes- 
sional Duties  of  Attorneys  and  Solicitors  (1848) ; The 
Intellectual  and  Moral  Improvement  of  the  Present 
Age  (1853);  Labor , Its  Rights , Difficulties , Dignity , 
and  Consolations (1856). 

A SLIGHT  COLD. 

Consider  a “ Slight  Cold  *’  to  be  in  the  nature  of  a 
chill,  caught  by  a sudden  contact  with  your  grave  ; or 
as  occasioned  by  the  damp  finger  of  Death  laid  upon 
you,  as  it  were,  to  mark  you  for  his,  in  passing  to  the 
more  immediate  object  of  his  commission.  Let  this  be 
called  “croaking,”  and  laughed  at  as  such  by  those  who 
are  “awearied  of  the  painful  round  of  life,”  and  are  on 
the  lookout  for  their  dismissal  from  it ; but  let  it  be 
learnt  by  heart,  and  be  remembered  as  having  the  force 
and  truth  of  gospel  by  all  those  who  would  “ measure 
out  their  span  upon  the  earth,”  and  are  conscious  of 
any  constitutional  flaw  or  feebleness  ; who  are  distin- 
guished by  any  such  tendency  deathward  as  long  necks, 
narrow  chicken-chests,  fair  complexions,  exquisite  sym- 
pathy with  atmospheric  variations  ; or,  in  short,  exhibit 
any  symptoms  of  an  asthmatic  or  consumptive  character 
— if  they  choose  to  neglect  a Slight  Cold. 

Let  not  those  complain  of  being  bitten  by  a reptile 
which  they  have  cherished  to  maturity  in  their  very 
bosoms,  when  they  might  have  crushed  it  in  the  egg  ! 
Now  if  we  call  a “ Slight  Cold,”  the  egg,  and  Pleurisy, 
Inflammation  of  the  Lungs,  Asthma,  Consumption,  the 
venomous  reptile,  the  matter  will  be  no  more  than  cor- 
rectly figured.  There  are  manv  ways  in  which  this 


f>2 


SAMUEL  WARREN 


“egg"  may  be  deposited  and  hatched  : Going  suddenly, 
slightly  clad,  from  a heated  into  a cold  atmosphere — • 
especially  if  you  can  contrive  to  be  in  a state  of  per- 
spiration ; sitting  or  standing  in  a draught,  however 
slight — it  is  the  breath  of  Death,  reader,  and  laden  with 
the  vapors  of  the  grave.  Lying  in  damp  beds — for 
there  his  cold  arms  shall  embrace  you  ; continuing  in 
wet  clothing,  and  neglecting  wet  feet — these,  and  a 
hundred  others,  are  some  of  the  ways  in  which  you  may, 
slowly,  imperceptibly,  but  surely,  cherish  the  creature 
that  shall  at  last  creep  inextricably  inward,  and  lie 
coiled  about  your  very  vitals.  Once  more — again — 
again — again — I would  say,  Attend  to  this  all  ye  who 
think  it  a small  matter  to  neglect  a Slight  Cold. — Pas • 
sages  from  the  Diary  of  a Late  Physician . 


WARTON,  Joseph,  D.D.,  an  English  critic  and 
poet,  born  at  Dunsford,  Surrey,  in  1 722,  and  died 
at  Wickham  in  1800.  He  was  educated  at  Win- 
chester and  Oxford.  He  was  successively  curate 
at  Basingstoke,  rector  of  Winslade,  then  of  Tun- 
worth,  master  at  Winchester,  prebendary  of  St. 
Paul’s  and  of  Winchester.  Besides  translations 
of  Virgil,  he  wrote  an  Essay  on  the  Writings  and 
Genius  of  Pope  (Vol.  I.,  1756;  Vol.  II.,  1782)  and 
numerous  critical  papers  in  The  Adventurer ; he 
also  edited  the  works  of  Pope  and  of  Dryden.  His 
Odes  on  Various  Subjects  (1746)  show  how  slight  a 
foundation  was  required  in  his  day  for  a poetic 
reputation.  The  following  extract  from  what  is 
regarded  as  the  best  of  his  odes  illustrates  his  de* 
gree  of  pictorial  ability,  and  also  the  versifying 
affectations  that  were  then  termed  “ elegant/' 

“ Warton’s  translation  [of  the  Georgies ] may 
in  many  instances  be  found  more  faithful  and 
concise  than  Dryden’s,”  says  Thomas  Campbell ; 
“ but  it  wants  that  elastic  and  idiomatic  freedom 
by  which  Dryden  reconciles  us  to  his  faults,  and 
exhibits  rather  the  diligence  of  a scholar  than  the 
spirit  of  a poet.” 

“To  every  classical  reader  Warton’s  Virgil  will 
afford  the  richest  fund  of  instruction  and  amuse« 
ment,”  says  the  Rev.  John  Wool. 


JOS&fH  WARTQM 


64 


TO  FANCY. 

O lover  of  the  desert,  hail  I 

Say  in  what  deep  and  pathless  vale, 

Or  on  what  hoary  mountain’s  side, 

’Midst  falls  of  water,  you  reside  ; 

’Midst  broken  rocks  a rugged  scene, 

With  green  and  grassy  dales  between ; 
’Midst  forests  dark  of  aged  oak, 

Ne’er  echoing  with  the  woodman’s  stroke, 
Where  never  human  heart  appeared, 

Nor  e’er  one  straw-roofed  cot  was  reared, 
Where  Nature  seemed  to  sit  alone, 
Majestic  on  a craggy  throne  ; 

Tell  me  the  path,  sweet  wand’rer,  tell, 

To  thy  unknown,  sequestered  cell, 

Where  woodbines  cluster  round  the  door. 
Where  shells  and  moss  o’erlay  the  floor, 
And  on  whose  top  a hawthorn  blows, 
Amid  whose  thickly  woven  boughs 
Some  nightingale  still  builds  her  nest, 
Each  evening  warbling  thee  to  rest ; 

Then  lay  me  by  the  haunted  stream, 

Rapt  in  some  wild,  poetic  dream, 

In  converse  while  methinks  I rove 
With  Spenser  through  a fairy  grove ; 

Till  suddenly  awaked,  I hear 
Strange  whispered  music  in  my  ear, 

And  my  glad  soul  in  bliss  is  drowned 
By  the  sweetly  soothing  sound.  . . . 

Yet  not  these  flowery  fields  of  joy 
Can  long  my  pensive  mind  employ ; 
Haste,  Fancy,  from  these  scenes  of  folly, 
To  meet  the  matron  Melancholy, 

Goddess  of  the  tearful  eye, 

That  loves  to  fold  her  arms  and  sigh! 

Let  us  with  silent  footsteps  go 
To  charnels  and  the  house  of  woe, 

To  Gothic  churches,  vaults,  and  tombs, 
Where  each  sad  night  some  virgin  comes, 
With  throbbing  breast,  and  faded  cheek. 


JOSEPH  WART  OH 


$5 


Her  promised  bridegroom’s  urn  to  seek ; 

Or  to  some  abbey’s  mouldering  towers, 
Where  to  avoid  cold  winter’s  showers. 

The  naked  beggar  shivering  lies 
Whilst  whistling  tempests  round  her  rise. 
And  trembles  lest  the  tottering  wall 
Should  on  her  sleeping  infants  fall. 

Now  let  us  louder  strike  the  lyre, 

For  my  heart  glows  with  martial  fire ; 

I feel,  I feel,  with  sudden  heat, 

My  big,  tumultuous  bosom  beat ! 

The  trumpet’s  clangors  pierce  my  ear, 

A thousand  widows’  shrieks  I hear ; 

“Give  me  another  horse,”  I cry, 

Lo  ! the  base  Gallic  squadrons  fly.  . . . 

When  young-eyed  Spring  profusely  throws 
From  her  green  lap  the  pink  and  rose  ; 

When  the  soft  turtle  of  the  dale 
To  summer  tells  her  tender  tale  ; 

When  Autumn  cooling  caverns  seeks, 

And  stains  with  wine  his  jolly  cheeks  • 

When  Winter,  like  poor  pilgrim  old. 

Shakes  his  silver  beard  with  cold— 

At  every  season  let  my  ear 
Thy  solemn  whispers,  Fancy,  hear. 


WARTON,  Thomas,  historian  of  English  pa 
etry,  born  at  Basingstoke  in  1728;  died,  May  21, 
1790.  He  was  a son  of  Thomas  Warton,  a profes- 
sor of  poetry  at  Oxford,  and  a brother  of  Joseph, 
and  was  himself  appointed  to  the  same  professor- 
ship in  1757,  also  occupying  a curacy  and  vicarship. 
His  great  work  was  a learned  History  of  English 
Poetry , from  the  Eleventh  to  the  Seventeenth  Century 
(1774-78).  Besides  this,  he  wrote  an  elaborate 
essay  on  Spenser’s  Faerie  Queene>  and  edited  the 
minor  poems  of  Milton,  with  abundant  notes.  He 
enjoyed  the  distinction  of  being  poet-laureate. 

“ Every  lover  of  Greek  literature  is  under  great 
obligations  to  the  very  learned  and  ingenious  Mr. 
Warton  for  this  magnificent  edition  of  Theocritus,” 
says  Dr.  Harwood,  in  his  View  of  the  Classics . 

Of  his  History  of  English  Poetry , Sir  Walter 
Scott  says : “ A work  of  great  size,  and,  poetically 
speaking,  of  great  interest,  from  the  perusal  of 
which  we  rise,  our  fancy  delighted  with  beautiful 
imagery  and  with  the  happy  analysis  of  ancient 
tale  and  song,  but  certainly  with  very  vague  ideas 
of  the  history  of  English  poetry.  The  error  seems 
to  lie  in  a total  neglect  of  plan  and  system ; for, 
delighted  with  every  interesting  topic  which  oc- 
curred, the  historical  poet  pursued  it  to  its  utmost 
verge,  without  considering  that  these  digressions, 
however  beautiful  and  interesting  in  themselves, 


THOMAS  WART  ON 


57 


abstracted  alike  his  own  attention  and  that  of  the 
reader  from  the  professed  purpose  of  his  book. 
Accordingly  Warton’s  History  of  English  Poetry 
has  remained,  and  will  always  remain,  an  immense 
commonplace  book  of  memoirs  to  serve  for  such 
an  history.’* 

“ He  rendered  great  service  to  literature  by  his 
agreeable  but  unfinished  History  of  English  Poetry f 
says  Professor  Shaw,  “ which  unfortunately  comes 
to  an  abrupt  termination  just  as  the  author  is 
about  to  enter  upon  the  glorious  period  of  the 
Elizabethan  era ; but  the  work  is  valuable  for  re- 
search and  a warm  tone  of  appreciative  criticism. 
Thomas  Warton  exhibited  his  knowledge  of  and 
fondness  for  Milton  in  an  excellent  edition  of  that 
poet,  enriched  with  valuable  notes.  The  best  of 
his  own  original  verses  are  sonnets,  breathing  a 
peculiar  tender  softness  of  feeling  and  showing 
much  picturesque  fancy.” 

ON  REVISITING  THE  RIVER  LODDON. 

Ah ! what  a weary  race  my  feet  have  run 

Since  first  I trod  thy  banks,  with  alders  crowned, 
And  thought  my  way  was  all  through  fairy  ground, 
Beneath  the  azure  sky  and  golden  sun — 

When  first  my  muse  to  lisp  her  notes  begun  I 
While  pensive  memory  traces  back  the  round 
Which  fills  the  varied  interval  between  ; 

Much  pleasure,  more  of  sorrow,  marks  the  scene. 
Sweet  native  stream  ! those  skies  and  suns  so  pure, 
No  more  return  to  cheer  my  evening  road ! 

Yet  still  one  joy  remains,  that  not  obscure 
Nor  useless,  all  my  vacant  days  have  flowed 
From  youth’s  gay  dawn  to  manhood’s  prime  mature, 
Nor  with  the  muse’s  laurel  unbestowed. 

Vo u XXXV.—s  ^ 


68 


THOMAS  WARTOH 


WRITTEN  IN  A BLANK  LEAF  OF  DUGDALE*S  MONASTICON, 

Deem  not  devoid  of  elegance  the  sage, 

By  Fancy’s  genuine  feelings  unbeguiled 
Of  painful  pedantry,  the  poring  child, 

Who  turns  of  these  proud  domes  the  historic  page, 
Now  sunk  by  time,  and  Henry’s  fiercer  rage. 

Think’st  thou  the  warbling  muses  never  smiled 
On  his  lone  hours  ? Ingenious  views  engage 
His  thoughts  on  themes  unclassic,  falsely  styled, 
Intent.  While  cloistered  piety  displays 

Her  mouldering  roll,  the  piercing  eye  explores 
New  manners,  and  the  pomp  of  elder  days, 

Whence  culls  the  pensive  bard  his  pictured  stores. 
Not  rough  nor  barren  are  the  winding  ways 
Of  hoar  antiquity,  but  strewn  with  flowers. 

ANCIENT  ENGLISH  ROMANCE. 

The  most  ancient  English  metrical  romance  which  I 
can  discover  is  entitled  the  Geste  of  King  Horne . It 
was  evidently  written  after  the  crusades  had  begun,  is 
mentioned  by  Chaucer,  and  probably  still  remains  in  its 
original  state.  I will  first  give  the  substance  of  the 
story,  and  afterward  add  some  specimens  of  the  com- 
position. But  I must  premise,  that  this  story  occurs  in 
very  old  French  metre  in  the  MSS.  of  the  British  Mu- 
seum, so  that  probably  it  is  a translation  : a circum- 
stance which  will  throw  light  on  an  argument  pursued 
hereafter,  proving  that  most  of  our  metrical  romances 
are  translated  from  the  French.  [But  notice  Saxon 
names.] 

Mury,  King  of  the  Saracens,  lands  in  the  king- 
dom of  Suddene,  where  he  kills  the  king  named  Allof. 
The  queen,  Godylt,  escapes ; but  Mury  seizes  on  her 
son  Horne,  a beautiful  youth  aged  fifteen  years,  and 
puts  him  into  a galley,  with  two  of  his  playfellows, 
Achulph  and  Fykenyld  : the  vessel  being  driven  on  the 
coast  of  the  kingdom  of  Westnesse,  the  young  prince  is 
found  by  Aylmar,  king  of  that  country,  brought  to 
court,  and  delivered  by  Athelbrus  his  steward,  to  b« 


I 


THOMAS  WART  OH  69 

educated  in  hawking,  harping,  tilting,  and  other  courtly 
accomplishments.  Here  the  princess  Rymenild  falls  in 
love  with  him,  declares  her  passion,  and  is  betrothed. 
Horne,  in  consequence  of  this  engagement,  leaves  the 
princess  for  seven  years,  to  demonstrate,  according  to 
the  ritual  of  chivalry,  that  by  seeking  and  accomplish- 
ing dangerous  enterprises  he  deserved  her  affection. 
He  proves  a most  valorous  and  invincible  knight;  and 
at  the  end  of  seven  years,  having  killed  King  Mury,  re- 
covered his  father’s  kingdom,  and  achieved  many  signal 
exploits,  recovers  the  Princess  Rymenild  from  the 
hands  of  his  treacherous  knight  and  companion  Fyken- 
yld.  . . . 

The  poem  itself  begins  and  proceeds  thus : 

Alle  hes  ben  blythe,  that  to  my  songe  ylythe  : 

A songe  yet  ulle  ou  singe  of  Allof  the  god  kynge, 

Kynge  he  was  by  weste  the  whiles  hit  y leste  ; 

And  Godylt  his  gode  quene,  no  feyrore  myhte  bene. 

And  huere  sone  hihte  Horne,  feyrore  childe  ne  myht  be  borne : 
For  reyne  ne  myhte  by  ryne  ne  sonne  myhte  shine 
Feyror  childe  than  he  was,  bryht  so  ever  eny  glas, 

So  whyte  so  eny  lilye  floure,  so  rose  red  was  his  colour ; 

He  was  feyre  ant  eke  bold,  and  of  fyfteene  wynter  old, 

This  non  his  yliche  in  none  kinges  ryche. 

— History  of  English  Poetry . 


WASHINGTON,  George,  first  President  of 
the  United  States,  born  in  Westmoreland  County, 
Va.,  February  22,  1732  ; died  at  Mount  Vernon,  on 
the  Potomac,  December  14,  1799.  The  Life  of 
Washington  has  been  ably  written  by  John  Mar- 
shall (1805),  succinctly  by  Jared  Sparks,  as  a pre- 
fix to  The  Writings  of  Washington  (1834),  and  best 
of  all,  upon  the  whole,  by  Washington  Irving 
(1855).  There  are  numerous  other  Lives  of  Wash- 
ington, among  which  is  a curious  Vita  Washing- 
tonii , written  in  Latin  by  Francis  Glass,  an  obscure 
schoolmaster  in  Ohio  (1835).  Washington  de- 
serves a place  in  the  history  of  literature,  although 
he  wrote  nothing  especially  designed  for  publica- 
tion except  his  “ Farewell  Address  ” to  the  Amer- 
ican people,  and  this,  though  drawn  up  from  his 
own  memoranda,  submitted  to  his  revisal,  and 
copied  out  by  himself,  was,  as  a composition,  es- 
sentially the  work  of  Alexander  Hamilton.  The 
Writings  of  George  Washington,  selected  and  edited 
by  Jared  Sparks  (12  vols.,  1838-40),  consist  in  great 
part  of  letters  of  a public  or  private  nature,  and 
are  of  special  historical  and  biographical  value. 
The  Writings  of  George  Washington , Including  His 
Diaries  and  Correspondence , edited  by  Worthing- 
ton C.  Ford,  appeared  in  1889. 


GEORGE  WASHINGTON 


11 


RESPECTING  HIS  STEP-SON,  J'/HN  PARK  CUSTIS. 

I write  to  you  on  a subject  of  importance,  and  of  no 
small  embarrassment  to  me.  My  son-in-law  and  ward, 
Mr.  Custis,  has,  as  I have  been  informed,  paid  his  ad- 
dresses to  your  second  daughter;  and,  having  made  some 
progress  in  her  affections,  has  solicited  her  in  marriage. 
How  far  a union  of  this  sort  may  be  agreeable  to  you, 
you  best  can  tell ; but  I should  think  myself  wanting  in 
candor  were  I not  to  confess  that  Miss  Nelly’s  amiable 
qualities  are  acknowledged  on  all  hands,  and  that  an 
alliance  with  your  family  will  be  pleasing  to  his.  This 
acknowledgment  being  made,  you  must  permit  me  to 
add,  sir,  that  at  this,  or  in  any  short  time,  his  youth, 
inexperience,  and  unripened  education  are,  and  will  be, 
insuperable  obstacles,  in  my  opinion,  to  the  completion 
of  the  marriage. 

As  his  guardian,  I conceive  it  my  indispensable  duty 
to  endeavor  to  carry  him  through  a regular  course  of 
education  (many  branches  of  which,  I am  sorry  to  say, 
he  is  totally  deficient  in),  and  to  guide  his  youth  to  a 
more  advanced  age,  before  an  event  on  which  his  own 
peace  and  the  happiness  of  another  depend  takes 
place.  . 

If  the  affection  which  they  have  avowed  for  each 
other  is  fixed  upon  a solid  basis,  if  will  receive  no  dim- 
inution in  the  course  of  two  or  three  years  ; in  which 
time  he  may  prosecute  his  studies,  and  thereby  render 
himself  more  deserving  of  the  young  lady,  and  useful  to 
society.  If,  unfortunately— as  they  are  both  young — 
there  should  be  an  abatement  of  affection  on  either  side, 
or  both,  it  had  better  precede  than  follow  marriage. 

Delivering  my  sentiments  thus  freely  will  not,  I hope, 
lead  you  into  a belief  that  I am  desirous  of  breaking 
off  the  match.  To  postpone  it  is  all  I have  in  view  ; 
for  I shall  recommend  to  the  young  gentleman,  with  the 
warmth  that  becomes  a man  of  honor,  to  consider  him- 
self engaged  to  your  daughter  as  if  the  indissoluble 
knot  were  tied ; and  as  the  surest  means  of  effecting 
this,  to  apply  himself  closely  to  his  studies ; by  which 
he  will  in  a great  measure  avoid  those  little  flirtations 


72 


GEORGE  WASHINGTON 


with  other  young  ladies,  that  may,  by  dividing  the  at- 
tention, contribute  not  a little  to  divide  the  affection.— 
To  Mr.  Calvert : 1773 . 

ON  THE  EARLY  DISPUTES  WITH  GREAT  BRITAIN. 

At  a time  when  our  lordly  masters  in  Great  Britain 
will  be  satisfied  with  nothing  less  than  the  deprivation 
of  American  freedom,  it  seems  necessary  that  something 
should  be  done  to  avert  the  stroke,  and  maintain  the 
liberty  which  we  have  derived  from  our  ancestors.  But 
the  manner  of  doing  it,  to  answer  the  purpose  effectu- 
ally, is  the  point  in  question.  That  no  man  should 
scruple  or  hesitate  a moment  in  defence  of  so  valuable 
a blessing,  is  clearly  my  opinion ; yet  arms  should  be 
the  last  recourse — the  dernier  ressort.  We  have  already, 
it  is  said,  proved  the  inefficacy  of  addresses  to  the 
throne,  and  remonstrances  to  Parliament.  How  far 
their  attention  to  our  rights  and  interests  is  to  be 
awakened,  or  alarmed,  by  starving  their  trade  and 
manufactures,  remains  to  be  tried.  The  Northern  Col- 
onies, it  appears,  are  endeavoring  to  adopt  this  scheme. 
In  my  opinion,  it  is  a good  one,  and  must  be  attended 
with  salutary  effects,  provided  it  can  be  carried  pretty 
generally  into  execution.  . . . 

That  there  will  be  a difficulty  attending  it  everywhere 
from  clashing  interests,  and  selfish,  designing  men  ever 
attentive  to  their  own  gain  and  watchful  of  every  turn 
that  can  assist  their  designing  views  ; and  in  the  tobacco 
colonies,  where  the  trade  is  so  diffused,  and  in  a man- 
ner wholly  conducted  by  factors  for  their  principals  at 
home,  these  difficulties  are  considerably  enhanced,  but 
I think  not  insurmountably  increased,  if  the  gentlemen 
in  their  several  counties  will  be  at  some  pains  to  ex- 
plain matters  to  the  people,  and  stimulate  them  to  pur- 
chase none  but  certain  enumerated  articles  out  of  any 
of  the  stores,  after  a definite  period,  and  neither  import 
or  purchase  any  themselves.  ...  ® 

\ can  see  but  one  class  of  people — the  merchants  ex- 
cepted— who  will  not,  or  ought  not,  to  wish  well  to  the 
scheme  : namely  they  who  live  genteelly  and  hospitably 
s>n  their  estates.  Such  as  these,  were  thev  not  to  con- 


GEORGE  WASHINGTON 


73 


sider  the  valuable  object  in  view,  and  the  good  of  others, 
might  think  it  hard  to  be  curtailed  in  their  living  and 
enjoyments. — To  George  Mason : i/6p. 

ACCEPTING  THE  COMMAND  OF  THE  ARMY. 

You  may  believe  me,  when  I assure  you  in  the  most 
solemn  manner  that,  so  far  from  seeking  this  employ- 
ment, I have  used  every  effort  in  my  power  to  avoid  it, 
not  only  from  my  unwillingness  to  part  with  you  and 
the  family,  but  from  a consciousness  of  its  being  a trust 
too  great  for  my  capacity ; and  I should  enjoy  more 
real  happiness  in  one  month  with  you  at  home  than  I 
have  the  most  distant  prospect  of  finding  abroad,  if  my 
stay  were  to  be  seven  times  seven  years.  But  as  it  has 
been  a kind  of  destiny  that  has  thrown  me  upon  this 
service,  I shall  hope  that  my  undertaking  it  is  designed 
to  answer  some  good  purpose.  . . . 

I shall  rely  confidently  on  that  Providence  which  has 
heretofore  preserved  and  been  bountiful  to  me,  not 
doubting  but  that  I shall  return  safe  to  you  in  the  fall. 
I shall  feel  no  pain  from  the  toil  or  danger  of  the  cam- 
paign ; my  unhappiness  will  flow  from  the  uneasiness  I 
know  you  will  feel  from  being  left  alone.  I therefore 
beg  that  you  will  summon  your  whole  fortitude,  and 
pass  your  time  as  agreeably  as  possible.  Nothing  will 
give  me  so  much  sincere  satisfaction  as  to  hear  this, 
and  to  hear  it  from  your  own  pen.— To  His  Wife: 
June,  1775. 

ON  PROFANITY  IN  THE  ARMY. 

That  the  troops  may  have  an  opportunity  of  attend- 
ing public  worship,  as  well  as  to  take  some  rest  after 
the  great  fatigue  they  have  gone  through,  the  General 
in  future  excuses  them  from  fatigue-duty  on  Sundays, 
except  at  the  ship-yards,  or  on  special  occasions,  until 
further  orders.  The  General  is  sorry  to  be  informed 
that  the  foolish  and  wicked  practice  of  profane  swear- 
ing— a vice  heretofore  little  known  in  an  American 
army — is  growing  into  fashion.  He  hopes  the  officers 
will,  by  example  as  well  as  influence,  endeavor  to  check 
it ; and  that  both  they  and  the  men  will  reflect  that  we 
can  have  little  hope  of  the  blessing  of  Heaven  upon 


74 


GEORGE  WASHINGTON 


our  arms  if  we  insult  it  by  our  impiety  and  folly.  Added 
to  this,  it  is  a vice  so  mean  and  low,  without  any  temp- 
tation, that  every  man  of  sense  and  character  detests 
it.— General  Order , August  y,  1773. 

GOD  RULING  THE  AFFAIRS  OF  NATIONS. 

It  would  be  peculiarly  improper  to  omit  in  this  first 
official  act  my  fervent  supplications  to  that  Almighty 
Being  Who  rules  over  the  universe,  Who  presides  in  the 
councils  of  nations,  and  Whose  Providential  aids  can 
supply  every  human  defect,  that  His  benediction  may 
consecrate  to  the  liberties  and  happiness  of  the  people 
of  the  United  States  a government  instituted  by  them- 
selves for  these  essential  purposes  ; and  may  enable 
every  instrument  employed  in  the  administration  to  ex- 
ecute with  success  the  functions  allotted  to  its  charge. 

In  tendering  this  homage  to  the  Great  Author  of 
every  public  and  private  good,  I assure  myself  that  it 
expresses  your  sentiments  not  less  than  my  own,  nor 
those  of  my  felIow°citizens  less  than  either.  No  people 
can  be  bound  to  acknowledge  and  adore  the  invisible 
hand  which  conducts  the  affairs  of  men  more  than  the 
people  of  the  United  States.  Every  step  by  which  they 
have  advanced  to  the  character  of  an  independent  na- 
tion seems  to  have  been  distinguished  by  some  token 
of  Providential  agency,  and  in  the  important  revolution 
just  accomplished  in  the  system  of  their  united  govern- 
ment the  tranquil  deliberations  and  voluntary  consent 
of  so  many  distinct  communities  from  which  the  event 
has  resulted,  cannot  be  compared  with  the  means  by 
which  most  governments  have  been  established  with- 
out some  return  of  pious  gratitude,  along  with  an  hum- 
ble anticipation  of  the  future  blessing  which  the  past 
seems  to  presage. — Liaugural  Address , April 30,  1789. 

TO  LAFAYETTE,  ON  SLAVERY. 

The  scheme  which  you  propose,  as  a precedent  to 
encourage  the  emancipation  of  the  black  people  in  this 
country  from  the  state  of  bondage  in  which  they  are 
held,  is  a striking  evidence  of  the  benevolence  of  your 
<*eart,  and  I shall  be  happy  to  join  you  in  so  laudable  a 
work.  Your  purchase  of  an  estate  in  the  colony  of 


GEORGE  WASHINGTON' 


75 


Cayenne,  with  a view  of  emancipating  the  slaves  on  it, 
is  a generous  and  noble  proof  of  your  humanity.  Would 
to  God  a like  spirit  might  diffuse  itself  generally  into 
the  minds  of  the  people  of  this  country  ! But  I despair 
of  seeing  it.  There  is  not  a man  living  who  wishes 
more  earnestly  than  I do  to  see  a plan  adopted  for  the 
abolition  of  it.  But  there  is  only  one  proper  and  ef- 
fectual mode  by  which  it  can  be  accomplished  ; and  that 
is  by  legislative  authority;  and  th’s  as  far  as  my  suf- 
frage will  go,  shall  never  be  wanting.  I never  mean, 
unless  some  particular  circumstances  should  compel  me 
to  it,  to  possess  another  slave  by  purchase ; it  being 
among  my  first  wishes  to  see  some  plan  adopted  by 
which  slavery  in  this  country  may  be  abolished  by  law. 

TESTAMENTARY  EMANCIPATION  OF  HIS  SLAVES. 

I,  George  Washington,  of  Mount  Vernon,  a citizen  of 
the  United  States,  and  lately  President  of  the  same,  do 
make,  ordain,  and  declare  this  instrument,  which  is 
written  with  my  own  hand,  and  every  page  thereof  sub- 
scribed with  my  name,  to  be  my  last  Will  and  Testa- 
ment, revoking  all  others.  . . . 

Item . Upon  the  decease  of  my  wife,  it  is  my  will 
and  desire  that  all  the  slaves  whom  I hold  in  my  own 
right  shall  receive  their  freedom.  To  emancipate  them 
during  her  life  would,  though  earnestly  wished  by  me, 
be  attended  by  such  insuperable  difficulties,  on  account 
of  their  intermixture  by  marriage,  with  the  dower 
negroes,  as  to  excite  the  most  painful  sensations,  if  not 
disagreeable  consequences  to  the  latter,  while  both 
descriptions  are  in  the  occupancy  of  the  same  proprie- 
tor ; it  not  being  in  my  power,  under  the  tenure  by 
which  the  dower  negroes  are  held,  to  emancipate  them. 
And  whereas,  among  those  who  will  receive  freedom 
according  to  this  devise,  there  may  be  some  who, 
from  old  age  or  bodily  infirmities,  and  others  on  ac- 
count of  their  infancy,  be  unable  to  support  them- 
selves, it  is  my  will  and  desire  that  all  who  come  under 
the  first  and  second  description  shall  be  comfortably 
clothed  and  fed  by  my  heirs  while  they  live  ; and  that 
such  of  the  latter  description  as  have  no  parents  living. 


76 


GEORGE  WASHINGTON 


or,  if  living,  are  unable  or  unwilling  to  provide  for 
them,  shall  be  bound  by  the  Court  until  they  arrive  at 
the  age  of  twenty-five  years  ; and,  in  cases  where  no 
record  can  be  produced  whereby  their  ages  can  be  as- 
certained, the  judgment  of  the  court,  upon  its  own  view 
of  the  subject,  shall  be  adequate  and  final. 

The  negroes  thus  bound  are  (by  their  masters  or  mis- 
tresses) to  be  taught  to  read  and  write,  and  to  be  brought 
up  to  some  useful  occupation,  agreeably  to  the  laws  of 
the  Commonwealth  of  Virginia,  providing  for  the  sup- 
port of  orphan  and  other  poor  children.  And  I do  ex- 
pressly forbid  the  sale  or  transportation  out  of  the  said 
Commonwealth  of  any  slave  I may  die  possessed  of, 
under  any  pretence  whatsoever.  And  so  I do,  more- 
over, most  pointedly  and  most  solemnly  enjoin  it  upon 
my  executors  hereafter  named,  or  the  survivors  of  them, 
to  see  that  this  clause  respecting  slaves,  and  every  part 
thereof,  be  religiously  fulfilled  at  the  epoch  at  which  it  is 
directed  to  take  place,  without  evasion,  neglect,  or  de- 
lay, after  the  crops  which  are  then  on  the  ground  are 
harvested,  particularly  as  respects  the  aged  or  infirm ; 
seeing  that  a regular  and  permanent  fund  be  established 
for  their  support,  as  long  as  there  are  subjects  requir- 
ing it ; not  trusting  to  the  uncertain  provision  to  be 
made  by  individuals. 

And  to  my  mulatto  man,  William,  calling  himself 
William  Lee,  I give  immediate  freedom,  or,  if  he  should 
prefer  (on  account  of  the  accidents  which  have  befallen 
him,  and  which  have  rendered  him  incapable  of  walking 
or  of  any  active  employment),  to  remain  in  the  situation 
he  now  is,  it  shall  be  optional  in  him  to  do  so  ; in  either 
case,  however,  I allow  him  an  annuity  of  thirty  dollars, 
during  his  natural  life,  which  shall  be  independent  of 
the  victuals  and  clothes  he  has  been  accustomed  to  re- 
ceive, if  he  chooses  the  last  alternative  ; but  in  full  with 
his  freedom,  if  he  prefers  the  first ; and  this  I give  him 
as  a testimony  of  my  sense  of  his  attachment  to  me,  and 
for  his  faithful  services  during  the  Revolutionary  War. 

Besides  the  slaves  which  Washington  held  in 
his  own  right  there  were  some  thirty  or  forty  be- 
longing to  the  estate  of  Bartholomew  Dandridge* 


GEORGE  WASHINGTON 


77 


the  deceased  brother  of  Mrs.  Washington;  these 
had  been  levied  upon  by  execution,  and  bought  in 
by  Washington,  who  had  suffered  them  to  remain 
in  the  possession  of  Bartholomew’s  widow  during 
her  life ; upon  her  death  they  were  also  to  be 
manumitted  in  a manner  similar  to  those  already 
provided  for.  The  will  is  a very  long  one,  as 
there  was  much  property  of  various  kinds  to  be 
devised;  and  the  will  had  been  drawn  up  by  him- 
self, “ no  professional  character  having  been  con- 
sulted, or  having  had  any  agency  in  the  draft.”  It 
closes  with  a provision  designed  to  prevent  any 
possible  litigation  in  respect  to  its  provisions. 

FORESTALLING  LITIGATION. 

I hope  and  trust  that  no  disputes  will  arise.  But  if, 
contrary  to  expectation,  the  case  should  be  otherwise, 
from  the  want  of  legal  expressions  or  the  usual  technical 
terms,  or  because  too  much  has  been  said  on  any  of  the 
devises  to  be  consonant  with  law,  my  will  and  direction 
expressly  is,  that  all  disputes  (if  unhappily  any  should 
arise)  shall  be  decided  by  three  impartial  and  intelligent 
men,  known  for  their  probity  and  good  understanding, 
two  to  be  chosen  by  the  disputants,  each  having  the  choice 
of  one,  and  the  third  by  those  two  ; which  three  men,  thus 
chosen,  shall,  unfettered  by  law  or  legal  constructions, 
declare  their  sense  of  the  testator’s  intention  ; and  such 
decision  is,  to  all  intents  and  purposes,  to  be  as  binding 
on  the  parties  as  if  it  had  been  given  in  the  Supreme 
Court  of  the  United  States. 

This  will,  which,  as  Washington  says,  “had  oc- 
cupied many  of  my  leisure  hours,”  was  executed 
on  July  9,  1799.  He  had  entered  upon  his  sixty- 
seventh  year ; but  there  was  every  reason  to  antic- 
ipate for  him  several  years  more  of  earthly  life,  in- 
stead of  the  six  months  which  were  allotted  to  him. 


WASSON,  David  Atwood,  a Unitarian  minis- 
ter, essayist,  and  poet,  born  at  Brooksville,  Me., 
May  14,  1823;  died,  January  21,  1887.  Curiously, 
the  family  name  is  remotely  connected  with  that 
of  Gustavus  Vasa  and  George  Washington.  The 
subject  of  this  notice  was  educated  at  North  Yar- 
mouth, Phillips  Academy  at  Andover,  Bowdoin 
College,  and  the  Theological  Seminary  at  Bangor. 
In  1851  he  became  pastor  at  Groveland,  Mass. 
The  next  year,  having  departed  from  the  ancient 
faith,  he  undertook  a new  independent  church  in 
the  same  place.  Several  years  after  this  he  be- 
came colleague  of  the  Rev.  T.  W.  Higginson  at 
Worcester,  then  travelled  abroad,  resided  in 
Concord,  was  minister  of  Theodore  Parker’s  So- 
ciety in  Boston  (1865-67),  passed  some  years  in 
Germany,  and  retired  to  West  Medford,  Mass. 
His  remarkably  vigorous  essays  and  reviews  ap- 
peared mostly  in  the  Christian  Examiner  and 
Atlantic  Monthly.  A selection,  with  Memoir,  has 
been  published  bjr  the  Rev.  O.  B.  Frothingham 
(1889),  also  a volume  of  Poems. 

“ Mr.  Wasson,”  sa}^s  Octavius  Brooks  Frothing, 
ham,  “was  a conscientious  and  industrious  but 
fastidious  writer.  . . . The  book — or  books, 

for  there  seems  to  have  been  two  on  social  and 
political  subjects — on  which  he  had  labored  for 
several  years  apparently  never  satisfied  his  taste, 


DAVID  ATWOOD  WASSON 


79 


and  the  sections  were  not  completed,  though 
chapters  were  published  as  essays,  from  time  to 
time.  His  sermons — plain,  direct,  sincere — contain, 
in  parenetical  form,  his  leading  ideas.  They  are 
singularly  frank  and  modern.  His  correspondence 
was  never  large,  . . . though  such  letters  as 

remain  are  models  of  that  kind  of  composition, 
combining  ease  of  personal  allusion  with  com- 
ments on  public  men,'  and  criticism  on  current 
affairs.  . . . He  was  heroic,  brave,  patient, 

aspiring.  He  was  proud,  with  a praiseworthy 
pride ; angry,  with  a righteous  indignation.  He 
was,  if  possible,  too  prevailingly  intellectual — not 
a common  infirmity,  an  exceedingly  rare  one,  in 
fact.” 

SUFFRAGE  A TRUST. 

The  moral  right  to  assume  any  controlling  or  im- 
portant function  in  society  cannot  be  rationally  con- 
ceived  of  otherwise  than  as  contingent  upon  the  ability 
to  exercise  it  with  good  effect  to  all  concerned.  Doubt- 
less there  may  be  a natural  right  of  every  man  to  put  a 
written  or  printed  name  into  a wooden  box,  if  such  be 
his  pleasure  ; but  that  which  distinguishes  a vote  is  its 
acknowledged  power  to  bind  the  community  as  a whole  ; 
and  this  power  is  no  property  of  the  individual  simply 
as  such.  Whence  this  power?  To  answer  the  ques- 
tion were  to  write  or  recite  a primary  chapter  in  politi- 
cal philosophy,  for  which  this  is  not  the  place.  But  the 
upshot  of  the  matter  is  simply  this  : Suffrage  is  a means 
to  an  end,  and  legitimate  only  as  it  serves  toward  an 
end.  Moreover,  it  is  an  instituted  means,  one  part  of 
the  entire  political  system,  and  grounded,  like  every 
other  part,  in  the  Constitution  of  the  State.  It  implies, 
not  indeed  a formal  contract,  but  a moral  engagement, 
to  which  the  corporate  community  in  its  wholeness,  in- 
cluding men,  women,  and  minors,  is  one  party,  the  in- 
dividual voter  another  He  is  engaged  to  promote  the 


So 


DAVID  ATWOOD  WASSON 


public  welfare,  and  the  corporate  community  is  engaged 
to  acknowledge  his  expression  of  choice  as  authorita- 
tive. Hence  the  voter  is  a political  functionary,  and 
in  a place  cf  trust,  no  less  truly  than  the  governor 
of  the  Commonwealth.  Governor  Butler  is  in  his  place 
to  act  under  the  Constitution  for  the  Commonwealth  of 
Massachusetts,  to  the  end  that  it  may  be  ordered  in 
justice,  and  wisely  provided  for  ; and  every  man  who 
voted  for  or  against  him  was  at  the  polls  to  act  under 
the  same  Constitution  for  the  same  corporate  body  and 
to  the  same  end.  One  of  the  remonstrants  before  the 
committee  said  that  suffrage  is  not  a private  right,  but 
a political  privilege.  He  was  thinking  toward  the  truth, 
but  “privilege  ” is  not  the  word,  for  it  signifies  a some- 
what conferred  or  conceded  for  the  particular  benefit 
of  the  recipient.  Suffrage  is  a functional  trust,  insti- 
tuted and  assigned  not  for  the  particular  benefit  of  the 
voter,  or  the  voting  class,  but  for  that  of  the  civil  com- 
munity in  its  present  wholeness  and  historic  continuity. 
No  other  conception  of  it  is  either  rational  or  mor- 
al. When,  therefore,  someone  comes  forward  to  say, 
“ I claim  suffrage  as  my  right,”  let  our  legislators  re- 
member that  there  is  another  right,  of  which  they  are 
the  present  custodians,  and  which  is  not  merely  puta- 
tive or  asserted,  but  as  unquestionable  as  it  is  impor- 
tant. It  is  the  grand  right  of  the  Commonwealth  of 
Massachusetts  to  be  ordered  and  ruled  in  the  best  way 
without  injurious  or  needless  costs.  Here  is  a right 
worth  talking  of,  a right  to  which  every  possible  right 
to  vote  is  subsidiary,  and  one,  too,  which  appertains  to 
the  infant  in  the  cradle  no  less  than  to  any  adult,  male 
or  female. 


IDEALS. 

Angels  of  growth,  of  old,  in  that  surprise 
Of  your  first  vision,  wild  and  sweet, 

I poured  in  passionate  sighs 
My  wish  unwise 

That  ye  descend  my  heart  to  meet— 

My  heart  so  slow  to  rise. 


DAVID  ATWOOD  IVANS' OAT 


ol 


Now  thus  I pray  : Angelic  be  to  hold 
In  heaven  your  shining  poise  afar, 

And  to  my  wishes  bold 
Reply  with  cold, 

Sweet  invitation,  like  a star 
Fixed  in  the  heavens  old. 

Did  ye  descend,  what  were  ye  more  than  I ? 
Is’t  not  by  this  ye  are  divine — 

That,  native  to  the  sky, 

Ye  cannot  hie 

Downward,  and  give  low  hearts  the  wine 
That  should  reward  the  high  ? 

Weak,  yet  in  weakness  I no  more  complain 
Of  your  abiding  in  your  places  : 

Oh,  still,  howe’er  my  pain 
Wild  prayers  may  rain, 

Keep  pure  on  high  the  perfect  graces 
That  stooping  could  but  stain. 

Not  to  content  your  lowness,  but  to  lure 
And  lift  us  to  your  angelhood, 

Do  your  surprises  pure 
Dawn  far  and  sure 

Above  the  tumult  of  young  blood, 

And  starlike  there  endure. 

Wait  there  ! wait,  and  invite  me  while  I climb 
For,  see,  I come  ! but  slow,  but  slow  ! 

Yet  ever  as  your  chime, 

Soft  and  sublime, 

Lifts  at  my  feet,  they  move,  they  go 
Up  the  great  stair  of  Time. 


WATERS,  Mrs.  Clara  Erskine  (Clement), 
an  American  noveiist  and  writer  on  art  topics, 
born  in  St.  Louis,  Mo.,  August  28,  1834.  Clement 
was  the  name  of  her  first  husband,  and  her  books 
still  bear  that  name ; she  afterward  married  Edwin 
F.  Waters,  and  went  to  live  in  Cambridge,  Mass. 
She  travelled  much  in  Europe  and  the  Orient,  and 
made  a vo)Tage  around  the  world.  Her  Simple 
Story  of  the  Orient  appeared  in  1869 ; Eleanor  Mait- 
land, a novel,  and  Egypt  in  1881 ; Charlotte  Cush - 
man,  in  1882;  The  Queen  of  the  Adriatic  (1893); 
Naples  the  City  of  Part henope  (1894).  Her  valuable 
publications  on  the  Fine  Arts  are  Handbook  of 
Legendary  and  Mythological  Art  (1871);  Painters , 
Sculptors , Architects , Engravers , and  Their  Works 
(1873);  Artists  of  the  Nineteenth  Century , Lawrence 
Hutton,  co-author  (1879) ; Outline  History  of  Paint- 
ing for  Young  People  and  Students  (1883);  Outline 
History  of  Sculpture  for  Young  People  and  Students 
(1885);  Christian  Symbols  and  Stories  of  the  Saints 
(1886) ; Stories  of  Art  and  Artists  (1866);  Handbook 
of  Christian  Symbols , Katherine  E.  Conway,  co- 
author. Besides  these  works,  Mrs.  Waters  has 
translated  a volume  of  Renan’s  lectures,  and 
Henri  Greville’s  Dosia's  Daughter , and  edited  Carl 
von  Lutzow’s  Treasures  of  Italian  Art, 

SIR  EDWIN  LANDSEER. 

John  Landseer  taught  his  son  to  look  to  Nature 
•bova  all  else  as  his  model,  and  Haydon,  the  painter. 


CLARA  ERSKINE  WATERS 


33 

who  instructed  his  brothers,  advised  Edwin  to  dissect 
animals  as  other  artists  dissected  their  subjects.  These 
two  pieces  of  advice  may  be  said  to  have  been  the  only 
important  teaching  which  Edwin  Landseer  received ; 
he  followed  them  both  faithfully,  and  when  thirteen 
years  old  made  his  first  exhibition  at  the  Royal  Acad- 
emy. During  fifty-eight  years  there  were  but  six  in 
which  he  did  not  send  his  pictures  there.  When  four- 
teen he  entered  the  Academy  schools,  and  divided  his 
time  between  sketching  from  the  wild  beasts  at  Exeter 
Change  and  drawing  in  the  classes.  He  was  a hand- 
some, manly  bov,  and  the  keeper,  Fuseli,  was  very  fond 
of  him,  calling  him,  as  a mark  of  affection,  “ My  little 
dog-boy.” 

He  was  very  industrious,  and  painted  many  pictures  ; 
the  best  one  of  what  are  known  as  his  early  works  is 
the  “ Cat’s- Paw,”  and  represents  a monkey  using  the 
paw  of  a cat  to,  push  hot  chestnuts  from  the  top  of  a 
stove  : the  struggles  of  the  cat  are  unavailing.  . . . 

Up  to  this  time  the  master  seems  to  have  thought 
only  of  making  exact  likenesses  of  animals,  just  as 
other  painters  had  done  before  him ; but  he  now 
began  to  put  something  more  into  his  works  and  to 
show  the  peculiar  power  which,  made  him  so  remarka- 
ble— a power  which  he  was  the  first  to  manifest  in  his 
pictures.  I mean  that  he  began  to  paint  animals  in 
their  relation  to  man,  and  to  show  how  they  are  his 
imitators,  his  servants,  friends,  and  companions.  . . . 

Sir  Walter  Scott  was  in  London  when  the  “Cat’s- 
Paw  ” was  exhibited,  and  was  so  pleased  by  the  picture 
that  he  sought  out  the  young  painter  and  invited  him 
to  go  home  with  him.  Sir  Waiter’s  well-known  love  for 
dogs  was  a foundation  for  the  intimate  affection  which 
grew  up  between  himself  and  Landseer.  In  1824  the 
painter  first  saw  Scotland,  and  during  fifty  years  he 
studied  its  people,  its  scenery,  its  customs  ; he  loved 
them  all,  and  could  ever  draw  new  subjects  and  new  en- 
thusiasm from  the  breezy  North.  Sir  Walter  wrote  in 
his  journal  : “ Landseer’s  dogs  are  the  most  magnifi- 
cent things  I ever  saw  ; leaping  and  bounding  and  grin- 
ning all  over  the  canvas.”  The  friendship  of  Sir  Walter 
had  a great  effect  upon  the  young  painter ; it  devel* 
You  XXIV.'— 6 


84 


CLARA  ERSKINE  WATERS 


oped  the  imagination  and  romance  of  his  nature,  and 
he  was  affected  by  the  human  life  of  Scotland,  so  that 
he  painted  the  shepherd,  the  gillie,  and  the  poacher, 
and  made  his  pictures  speak  the  tenderness  and  truth, 
as  well  as  the  fearlessness  and  the  hardihood,  of  the 
Gaelic  race.  The  free,  vigorous  Northern  life  brought 
to  the  surface  that  which  the  habits  of  a London  gentle- 
man in  brilliant  society  never  could  have  developed. 
One  critic  has  said  : “ It  taught  him  true  power ; it 
freed  his  imagination  ; it  braced  up  all  his  loose  abil- 
ity ; it  elevated  and  refined  his  mind  ; it  developed  his 
latent  poetry  ; it  completed  his  education.**  . . . 

Between  1835  and  1866  he  painted  almost  numberless 
pictures  of  the  Queen,  of  various  members  of  her  family, 
and  of  the  pets  of  the  royal  household.  In  1850  he  was 
knighted,  and  was  at  the  very  height  of  his  popularity 
and  success. 

An  anecdote  of  Sydney  Smith  relates  that  when  some- 
one asked  him  to  sit  to  Landseer  for  his  portrait,  he  re- 
plied : “ Is  thy  servant  a dog,  that  he  should  do  this 
great  thing ! *’  . . . 

Landseer  had  an  extreme  fondness  for  studying  and 
making  pictures  of  lions ; and  from  the  time  when,  as  a 
boy,  he  dissected  one,  he  tried  to  obtain  the  body  of 
every  lion  that  died  in  London.  Dickens  was  in  the 
habit  of  relating  that  on  one  occasion,  when  he  and  others 
were  dining  with  the  artist,  a servant  entered  and  asked  : 
“ Did  you  order  a lion,  sir  ? **  as  if  it  were  the  most  natu- 
ral thing  in  the  world.  The  guests  feared  that  a living 
lion  was  about  to  enter ; but  it  turned  out  to  be  only 
the  body  of  the  dead  “ Nero  ” of  the  Zoological  Gardens, 
which  had  been  sent  as  a gift  to  Sir  Edwin. 

His  skill  in  drawing  was  marvellous,  and  was  once 
shown  in  a rare  way  at  an  evening-party.  Facility  in 
drawing  had  been  the  theme  of  conversation,  when  a 
lady  declared  that  no  one  had  yet  drawn  two  objects  at 
the  same  moment.  Landseer  would  not  admit  that  this 
could  not  be  done,  and  immediately  took  two  pencils 
and  drew  a horse’s  head  with  one  hand,  and  at  precisely 
the  same  time  a stag’s  head  with  antlers  with  the  other. 
—Stories  of  Art  ap * Artist 


WATSON,  Henry  Clay,  an  American  jour- 
nalist and  historian,  born  at  Baltimore  in  1831; 
died  in  California  in  1869.  He  was  an  editor  of 
the  Philadelphia  North  American  and  the  Phila- 
delphia Evening  Journal ; and,  in  his  last  days,  of 
the  Sacramento  Times . Besides  some  volumes  of 
hunting-scenes,  he  published  Camp-Fires  of  the 
Revolution  (1851);  Nights  in  a Block-House  (1852); 
The  Old  Bell  of  Independence  (1852),  revised  as  No- 
ble Deeds  of  Our  Fathers  (1S88) ; The  Yankee  Teapot 
(1853) ; Lives  of  the  Presidents  of  the  United  States 
(1853);  Heroic  Women  of  History  (1853);  The  La- 
dies' Glee- Book  (1854) ; The  Masonic  Musical  Manual 
(1855),  and  The  Camp-Fires  of  Napoleon  (1856). 

THE  YOUNG  SENTINEL. 

As  he  approached,  the  captain  was  in  the  act  of  call- 
ing Arthur  Stewart,  a beardless  boy  then,  from  the 
ranks,  to  act  as  a sentinel  during  the  night.  The  gener- 
al, with  mingled  emotions  of  surprise  and  anger,  stepped 
up  to  the  captain,  and  taking  him  a little  to  one  side,  said: 
“ Captain  Wetherbe,  what  is  the  meaning  of  this  ? Are 
you  so  thoughtless  and  imprudent  as  to  select  a boy  for 
a sentinel  ? . . . You  know  that  the  British  army  is 

almost  within  musket-shot  of  the  American  lines.  Are 
we  not  in  imminent  danger  of  being  attacked  to-night  ? ” 

Stewart  had  taken  his  post  as  sentinel  during  the 
first  part  of  the  night.  It  so  happened  that  General 
Putnam  had  occasion  to  pass  outside  the  lines.  On  his 
way  he  did  not  encounter  Arthur  Stewart,  but  another 
Mstise! ; who,  ascertaining  that  it  was  the  general,  im- 


86 


HENRY  CLAY  WATSON 


mediately  allowed  him  to  pass.  After  being  absent  a 
short  time,  he  made  toward  the  lines,  as  though  he  in- 
tended to  return.  In  his  course  he  encountered  Stew- 
art. “ Who  goes  there  ?”  inquired  the  sentinel.  “ Gen- 
eral Putnam,”  was  the  reply.  “ We  know  no  General 
Putnam  here,”  Stewart  answered.  “But  /am  Gener- 
al Putnam,”  returned  that  person,  by  this  time  grow- 
ing somewhat  earnest.  “ Give  the  countersign,”  re- 
turned Stewart.  It  so  happened  that  the  general  had 
forgotten  what  the  countersign  was ; or  at  least  could 
not,  at  the  moment,  call  it  to  mind.  “ I have  forgotten 
it,”  was  the  reply.  “This  is  a pretty  story  from  the  lips 
of  General  Putnam.  You  are  a British  officer,  sent  over 
here  as  a spy,”  returned  Stewart,  who  was  well  aware 
chat  he  was  addressing  Putnam  ; for  the  moon  was  shin* 
ing  brightly,  and  revealed  the  features  of  the  general , 
but  he  had  the  staff  in  his  own  hand,  and  he  meant  to 
use  it.  “ I warrant  you  I am  not,”  said  the  general ; 
and  he  attempted  to  pass  on.  “ Pass  that  line,  sir,  and 
you  are  a dead  man  ! ” exclaimed  Stewart,  at  the  same 
time  cocking  his  gun.  “ Stop  where  you  are,  or  I’ll 
make  you  stop,”  continued  the  sentinel,  as  the  general 
disregarded  his  first  notice.  Hastily  raising  his  gun  to 
his  shoulder  and  taking  a somewhat  deliberate  aim,  he 
pulled  the  trigger ; but,  for  some  reason  or  other,  the 
discharge  did  not  follow.  “ Hold  ! hold  ! ” exclaimed 
Putnam.  “ I do  hold,”  was  the  reply  ; “ the  gun  holds 
its  charge  a great  deal  better  than  I intended  it  should  ; ” 
immediately  priming  his  musket  for  a second  trial 
“ You  are  not  priming  that  gun  for  me  ? ” asked  Putnam 
anxiously.  “ That  depends  entirely  upon  the  circum- 
stances. I warn  you,  once  more,  not  to  pass  thosf 
lines.”  “ But  I am  your  general,”  continued  Putnam 
“ I deny  it,  unless  you  give  the  countersign.”  Here  the 
general  was  at  fault.  He  strove  to  recall  the  important 
word  ; but  all  was  in  vain.  “ Boy,”  said  he,  “do  you 
not  know  me  ? I am  General  Putnam.”  “ A British 
officer,  more  like.  If  you  are  Putnam,  as  you  say,  why 
don’t  you  give  me  the  countersign  ? So  sure  as  I am 
my  mother’s  son,  if  you  attempt  to  pass  those  lines,  I’ll 
make  cold  meat  of  you.  I*m  a sentinel.  I know  my 
duty ; though  then*  are  some  people  in  the  world  who 


HENRY  CLAY  WATSON 


37 


are  marvellously  inclined  to  question  it.”  At  this,  Put- 
nam, finding  that  further  parley  would  be  useless,  de- 
sisted ; and  the  boy,  deliberately  shouldering  his  mus- 
ket, began,  with  a great  deal  of  assumed  haughtiness,  to 
pace  the  ground  as  before. 

Here  was  the  redout>Uottt  General  Putnam,  the  hero 
of  a hundred  battles,  kept  at  day  by  a stripling  of  seven- 
teen. This  scene,  in  my  humble  judgment,  would  have 
been  a fine  subject  for  a painter’s  pencil.  Putnam,  find- 
ing that  the  boy  was  in  earnest- — for  he  had  alarming 
proof  of  it— durst  not,  for  his  life,  proceed  a step  further. 
He  waited  until  Stewart  was  relieved  ; when  the  other 
sentinel,  finding  he  was,  in  truth,  General  Putnam,  al- 
lowed him  to  pass  without  giving  the  countersign.  But 
the  general’s  feelings  were  terribly  excited.  ...  A 
sense  of  honor  and  justice  returned  ; and,  sending  for 
the  boy  on  the  morrow,  he  thus  addressed  him:  . . . 

“ Did  you  know  the  man  who  encountered  you,  while  at 
your  post  ? ” “I  suspected  whom  he  might  be,”  returned 
the  boy.  . . . “ That's  right,”  said  the  general  ; “you 
did  just  as  I myself  would  have  done,  had  I been  in  your 
place.  We  have  nothing  to  fear  from  the  British,  or 
any  other  enemy,  with  such  soldiers  as  you.  Discipline 
is  the  soul  of  the  army.”  . . . Arthur  was,  shortly 

afterward,  promoted  to  the  rank  of  ensign. — Camp-Fires 
of  the  Revolution . 


WATSON,  Rev.  John  (Ian  Maclaren),  a Scottish 
clergyman  and  novelist;  born  in  Manningtree, 
Essex,  England,  in  1849.  Though  born  in  Eng. 
land,  he  is  of  pure  Scotch  blood.  He  was  edu- 
cated at  Edinburgh  University,  and  studied  for 
the  ministry  at  New  College,  Edinburgh.  While 
at  New  College  he  made  the  acquaintance  of  such 
men  as  Dr.  James  Stalker,  Professor  Henry 
Drummond,  Dr.  George  Adam  Smith,  and  others. 
His  first  pastorate  was  in  the  Free  Church  in 
Loglealmond,  Perthshire,  now  known  as  Drum- 
tochty.  He  is  now  the  minister  of  a Presbyterian 
church  in  Sefton  Park,  Liverpool.  It  was  not 
until  1893  that  Mr.  Watson  became  known  as  a 
writer.  He  has  published  Beside  the  Bonnie  Brier - 
Bush  and  The  Days  of  A uld  Lang  Syne . 

“ Translate  his  tales  and  sketches  wholly  into 
English,1 ” says  a noted  critic,  “and  they  will  lose 
more  than  half  theL  flv~r ; but  even  so,  something 
would  be  left — more  than  goes  to  the  making  of 
most  books  of  the  sort.  ‘ The  cunning  speech  of 
Drumtochty ’ — the  village  which  he  has  seized  for 
his  own — has  moulded  his  speech  in  passages  of 
description  and  exposition,  and  the  Drumtochty 
habit  of  alluding  carefully  to  its  ‘pints’  has  stood 
him  in  good  stead  all  through  his  book.  Mr. 
Maclaren’s  characters  are,  we  fear,  a trifle  too 

good  to  be  quite  true.  Drumtochty,  we  gather,, 

(88> 


JOHN  WATSON 


89 

is  neither  Highland  nor  Lowland,  but  lies  some- 
where in  the  foot-hills  of  the  Grampians ; so  pos- 
sibly its  citizens  may  combine  the  virtues  and 
avoid  the  faults  of  both  sections.” 


AS  A LITTLE  CHILD. 

The  minister  asked  Burnbrae  to  pray,  and  the  Spirit 
descended  on  that  good  man,  of  simple  heart : 

“Almichty  Father,  we  are  a’  Thy  puir  and  sinfu’ 
bairns,  wha  wearied  o*  hame  and  gaed  awa’  intae  the  far 
country.  Forgive  us,  for  we  didna  ken  that  we  were 
leavin’  or  the  sair  hert  we  gied  oor  Father.  It  was 
weary  wark  tae  live  wi’  oor  sins,  but  we  wud  never  hev 
come  back  had  it  no  been  for  oor  Elder  Brither.  He 
cam’  a long  road  tae  find  us,  and  a sore  travail  He  had 
afore  He  set  us  free.  He’s  been  a gude  Brither  tae  us, 
and  we’ve  been  a heavy  chairge  tae  Him.  May  He  keep 
a firm  haud  o’  us  and  keep  us  in  the  richt  road,  and 
bring  us  back  gin  we  wander,  and  tell  us  a*  we  need  tae 
know  till  the  gloamin’  come.  Gither  us  in  then,  we 
pray  Thee,  and  a’  we  luve,  no  a bairn  missin’,  and  may 
we  sit  doon  for  ever  in  oor  ain  Father’s  House.  Amen.” 
As  Burnbrae  said  Amen,  Carmichael  opened  his  eyes, 
and  had  a vision  which  will  remain  with  him  until  the 
day  break  and  the  shadows  flee  away. 

The  six  elders— three  small  farmers,  a tailor,  a stone- 
mason, and  a shepherd— were  standing  beneath  the  lamp, 
and  the  light  fell  like  a halo  on  their  bent  heads.  That 
poor  little  vestry  had  disappeared,  and  this  present 
world  was  forgotten.  The  sons  of  God  had  come  into 
their  heritage.  “ For  the  things  which  are  seen  are 
temporal,  but  the  things  which  are  not  seen  are  eter- 
nal.”— Beside  the  Bonnie  Brier-Bush, 


WATSON,  William,  an  English  poet,  born  in 
Wharfedale,  Yorkshire,  in  1855.  He  was  educated 
privately,  on  account  of  the  delicacy  of  his  health. 
After  his  twelfth  year,  however,  when  his  family 
removed  to  Southport,  his  health  gradually  bet- 
tered. In  1876  he  began  his  literary  work  by 
contributions  of  verse  and  prose  to  the  Liverpool 
Argus . In  1880  appeared  The  Prince's  Quest  (verse), 
which  attracted  little  attention.  It  was  not  until 
Wordsworth's  Grave  appeared  in  1891  that  he  began 
to  be  looked  upon  as  a poet  of  promise.  He  be- 
came famous  by  his  Lachrymce  Musarum , an  elegy 
on  the  death  of  Alfred  Tennyson,  and  containing 
many  touches  of  Milton’s  Lycidas.  The  poetry- 
reading world  at  once  declared  this  poem  the 
finest  of  the  many  tributes  paid  to  the  dead  lau- 
reate, and  a cash  gift  of  $1,000  was  tendered  to 
the  young  author  (November,  1892)  by  the  Glad- 
stone Government.  He  had  already  been  eagerly 
spoken  of  for  the  laureateship,  and  some  of  his 
friends,  thinking  the  proffered  bounty  was  in- 
tended to  dismiss  his  claim  to  the  successorship  of 
Tennyson,  advised  against  its  acceptance.  He  re- 
ceived assurances,  however,  that  nothing  of  the 
kind  was  intended,  and  accepted  the  gift.  The 
laureateship  remained  vacant  until  Salisbury  re* 
sumed  the  government.  Late  in  1892,  the  poet,  ow, 
ing  to  illness  and  overwork,  became  temporarily 

(90) 


WILLIAM  WATSON 


9* 

deranged,  and  was  confined  for  some  time  in  the 
Roehampton  Asylum.  He  was  soon  himself  again* 
and  the  year  1893  saw  a large  addition  to  his  pub- 
lished work.  In  March,  1895,  the  Government 
granted  him  an  annuity  of  $500.  In  1896  ap- 
peared his  sonnets  on  the  Armenian  massacres 
and  the  refusal  of  the  nations  to  intervene,  pub- 
lished under  the  title  The  Purple  East . These 
made  his  name  common  property  wherever  the 
English  tongue  is  spoken.  His  other  works  are 
Epigrams  of  Art,  Life , and  Nature  (1884) ; Ver  Ten - 
ebrosum  (a  sonnet  series  attacking  the  English  oc- 
cupation of  Egypt,  1885);  The  Eloping  Angels, 
Poems,  and  Excursions  in  Criticism  (1893)  ; Odes,  and 
Other  Poems  (1894);  The  Father  of  the  Forest,  and 
Other  Poems  (1895) ; The  Year  of  Shame  (including 
The  Purple  East,  1897). 

Theie  is  scarcely  a dissenting  voice  to  the 
chorus  that  has  hailed  Mr.  Watson  as  the  foremost 
living  English  poet,  n&&t  to  Swinburne.  Even  be- 
fore 1892  Tennyson  had  picked  him  out  for  com- 
mendation. “ Only  a great  poet,”  says  the  Spec- 
tator, “ could  have  written  that  line  [the  last  line 
in  the  Prelude  to  the  Hymn  of  the  Sed\.  The  line 
seems  to  us  the  greatest  which  even  great  poets 
have  written.  Milton  never  conceived  a more 
delicate  and  exquisite  symbol  of  the  awakening  of 
youth  to  the  beauty  of  a world,  to  which  it  con- 
tributes almost  as  much  loveliness  as  it  perceives 
in  it,  than  the  ‘ wondering  rose*  of  Mr.  Watson’s.” 

“ This  poet  is  the  foremost  among  his  contem- 
poraries,” says  the  Critic.  “He  has  imagination, 
he  is  thoughtful;  he  has  a gift  of  expression  and  a 


92 


WILLIAM  WATS OM 


freshness  of  phrase  which  give  a delightful  charm 
to  his  work,  and  make  one  wonder  whether  he  is 
not  a student  and  admirer  of  our  own  Aldrich; 
he  has  style,  and,  above  all,  a poet’s  high  regard 
for  the  rules  governing  his  art” 


WORDSWORTH’S  GRAVE. 

The  old,  rude  church,  with  bare,  bald  tower,  is  here ; 

Beneath  its  shadow  high-born  Rotha  flows ; 

Rotha,  remembering  well  who  slumbers  near, 

And  with  cold  murmur  lulling  his  repose. 

Rotha,  remembering  well  who  slumbers  near. 

His  hills,  his  lakes,  his  streams  are  with  him  yet. 
Surely  the  heart  that  read  her  own  heart  clear 
Nature  forgets  not  soon  : 'tis  we  forget. 

We  that  with  vagrant  soul  his  fixity 

Have  slighted  ; faithless,  done  his  deep  faith  wrong; 
Left  him  for  poorer  loves,  and  bowed  the  knee 
To  misbegotten,  strange  new  gods  of  song. 


Yet,  led  by  hollow  ghost  or  beckoning  elf 
Far  from  her  homestead  to  the  desert  bourn, 
The  vagrant  soul  returning  to  herself 
Wearily  wise,  must  needs  to  him  return. 


To  him  and  to  the  power  that  with  him  dwell — 
Inflowings  that  divulged  not  whence  they  came ; 
And  that  secluded  spirit  unknowable, 

The  mystery  we  make  darker  with  a name ; 

The  somewhat  which  we  name  but  cannot  know, 
Ev’n  as  we  name  a star  and  only  see 
His  quenchless  flashings  forth,  which  ever  show 
And  ever  hide  him,  and  which  are  not  he, 


WILLIAM  WATSON 


93 


LACHRYMiE  MUSA  RUM. 

(October  6,  /Spa.) 

Low,  Hke  another’s,  lies  the  laurelled  head : 

The  life  that  seemed  a perfect  song  is  o’er : 

Carry  the  last  great  bard  to  his  last  bed. 

Land  that  he  loved,  thy  noblest  voice  is  mute. 

Land  that  he  loved,  that  loved  him  ! nevermore 
Meadow  of  thine,  smooth  lawn  or  wild  sea-shore% 
Gardens  of  odorous  bloom  and  tremulous  fruit, 

Or  woodlands  old,  like  Druid  couches  spread, 

The  master’s  feet  shall  tread. 

Death’s  little  rift  hath  rent  the  faultless  lute : 

The  singer  of  undying  songs  is  dead. 

So,  in  this  season  pensive-hued  and  grave, 

While  fades  and  falls  the  doomed,  reluctant  leaf 
From  withered  Earth’s  fantastic  coronal, 

With  wandering  sighs  of  forest  and  of  wave 
Mingles  the  murmur  of  a people’s  grief 
For  him  whose  leaf  shall  fade  not,  neither  fall. 

He  hath  fared  forth,  beyond  these  suns  and  showers. 
For  us,  the  autumn  glow,  the  autumn  flame, 

And  soon  the  winter  silence  shall  be  ours i 
Him  the  eternal  spring  of  fadeless  fame 
Crowns  with  no  mortal  flowers. 

Rapt  though  he  be  from  us, 

Virgil  salutes  him,  and  Theocritus; 

Catullus,  mightiest-brained  Lucretius,  each 
Greets  him,  their  brother,  on  the  Stygian  beach; 
Proudly  a gaunt  right  hand  doth  Dante  reach  ; 
Milton  and  Wordsworth  bid  him  welcome  home: 
Bright  Keats  to  touch  his  raiment  doth  beseech; 
Coleridge,  his  locks  aspersed  with  fairy  foam ; 

Calm  Spenser,  Chaucer  suave, 

His  equal  friendship  crave  : 

And  godlike  spirits  hail  him  guest,  in  speech 
Of  Athens,  Weimar,  Stratford,  Rome. 


94 


WILLIAM  W ATSOH 


What  needs  his  laurel  our  ephemeral  tears, 

To  save  from  visitation  of  decay  ? 

Not  in  this  temporal  sunlight,  now,  that  bay 
Blooms,  nor  to  perishable  mundane  ears 
Sings  he  with  lips  of  transitory  clay  ; 

For  he  hath  joined  the  chorus  of  his  peers 
In  habitations  of  the  perfect  day  : 

His  earthly  notes  a heavenly  audience  hears, 

And  more  melodious  are  henceforth  the  spheres, 
Enriched  with  music  stol’n  from  earth  away. 

He  hath  returned  to  regions  whence  he  came* 

Him  doth  the  spirit  divine 
Of  universal  loveliness  reclaim. 

All  nature  is  his  shrine. 

Seek  him  henceforward  in  the  wind  and  sea, 

In  earth’s  and  air’s  emotion  or  repose, 

In  every  star’s  august  serenity, 

And  in  the  rapture  of  the  flaming  rose. 

There  seek  him,  if  ye  would  not  seek  in  vain, 

There,  in  the  rhythm  and  music  of  the  Whole  * 

Yea,  and  forever  in  the  human  soul 

Made  stronger  and  more  beauteous  by  his  strain. 

For  lo  i creation’s  self  is  one  great  choir, 

And  what  is  nature’s  order  but  the  rhyme 
Whereto  the  worlds  keep  time, 

And  all  things  move  with  all  things  from  their  prime  ? 
Who  shall  expound  the  mystery  of  the  lyre  ? 

In  far  retreats  of  elemental  mind 

Obscurely  comes  and  goes 

The  imperative  breath  of  song,  that  as  the  wind 

Is  trackless,  and  oblivious  whence  it  blows. 

Demand  of  lilies  wherefore  they  are  white, 

Extort  her  crimson  secret  from  the  rose, 

But  ask  not  of  the  Muse  that  she  disclose 
The  meaning  of  the  riddle  of  her  might : 

Somewhat  of  all  things  sealed  and  recondite, 

Save  the  enigma  of  herself  she  knows. 

The  master  could  not  tell,  with  all  his  lore, 

Wherefore  he  sang,  or  whence  the  mandate  sped : 
Ev’n  as  the  linnet  sings,  so  I.  he  said — 


WILLIAM  W ATSOM 


95 


Ah,  rather  as  the  imperial  nightingale, 

That  held  in  trance  the  ancient  Attic  shore, 

And  charms  the  ages  with  the  notes  that  o’er 
All  woodland  chants  immortally  prevail ! 

And  now,  from  our  vain  plaudits  greatly  fled. 

He  with  diviner  silence  dwells  instead, 

And  on  no  earthly  sea  with  transient  roar, 

Unto  no  earthly  airs,  he  trims  Hs  sail, 

But  far  beyond  our  vision  and  our  hail 
Is  heard  for  ever  and  is  seen  no  more. 

No  more,  oh,  never  now, 

Lord  of  the  lofty  and  the  tranquil  brow 
Whereon  nor  snows  of  time 
Have  fall’n,  nor  wintry  rime, 

Shall  men  behold  thee,  sage  and  mage  sublime. 

Once,  in  his  youth  obscure, 

The  maker  of  this  verse,  which  shall  endure 
By  splendor  of  its  theme  that  cannot  die, 

Beheld  thee  eye  to  eye, 

And  touched  through  thee  the  hand 
Of  every  hero  of  thy  race  divine, 

Ev’n  to  the  sire  of  all  the  laurelled  line, 

The  sightless  wanderer  on  the  Ionian  strand, 

Wide  as  his  skies  and  radiant  as  his  seas, 

Starry  from  haunts  of  his  Familiars  nine, 

Glorious  Maeonides. 

Yea,  I beheld  thee,  and  behold  thee  yet : 

Thou  hast  forgotten,  but  can  I forget  ? 

The  accents  of  thy  pure  and  sovereign  tongue, 

Are  they  not  ever  goldenly  impressed 
On  memory’s  palimpsest  ? 

I see  thy  wizard  locks  like  night  that  hung, 

I tread  the  floor  thy  hallowing  feet  have  trod  ; 

I see  the  hands  a nation’s  lyre  that  strung, 

The  eyes  that  looked  through  life  and  gazed  on  God. 
The  seasons  change,  the  winds  they  shift  and  veer  ; 
The  grass  of  yesteryear 
Is  dead  ; the  birds  depart,  the  groves  decay  : 
Empires  dissolve  and  peoples  disappear  : 

Song  passes  not  away. 

Captains  and  conquerers  leave  a little  dust, 

And  kings  a dubious  legend  of  their  reign  ; 


96 


WILLIAM  WATSO/f 


The  swords  of  Csesars,  they  are  less  than  ruit : 
The  poet  doth  remain. 

Dead  is  Augustus,  Maro  is  alive ; 

And  thou,  the  Mantuan  of  our  age  and  clime, 
Like  Virgil,  shalt  thy  race  and  tongue  survive, 
Bequeathing  no  less  honeyed  words  to  time, 
Embalmed  in  amber  of  eternal  rhyme, 

And  rich  with  sweets  from  every  Muse’s  hive ; 
While  to  the  measure  of  the  cosmic  rune 
For  purer  ears  thou  shalt  thy  lyre  attune, 

And  heed  no  more  the  hum  of  idle  praise 
In  that  great  calm  our  tumults  cannot  reach, 
Master  who  crown’st  our  immelodious  days 
With  flower  of  perfect  speech. 

HOW  WEARY  IS  OUR  HEART 

Of  kings  and  courts,  of  kingly,  courtly  ways 
In  which  the  life  of  man  is  bought  and  sold  : 

How  weary  is  our  heart  these  many  days ! 

Of  ceremonious  embassies  that  hold 
Parley  with  Hell  in  fine  and  silken  phrase, 

How  weary  is  our  heart  these  many  days  I 

Of  wavering  counsellors  neither  hot  nor  cold. 

Whom  from  His  mouth  God  speweth,  be  it  told 
How  weary  is  our  heart  these  many  days  1 

Yea,  for  the  ravelled  night  is  round  the  lands, 

And  sick  are  we  of  all  the  imperial  story. 

The  tramp  of  power,  and  its  long  trail  of  pain ; 

The  mighty  brows  in  meanest  arts  grown  hoary; 

The  mighty  hands, 

That  in  the  dear,  affronted  name  of  Peace 
Bind  down  a people  to  be  racked  and  slain ; 

The  emulous  armies  waxing  without  cease, 
All-puissant  all  in  vain  ; 

The  facts  and  leagues  to  murder  by  delays, 

And  the  dumb  throngs  that  on  the  deaf  throne’s  gaze 
The  common,  loveless  lust  of  territory  ; 

The  lips  that  only  babble  of  their  mart, 

While  to  the  night  the  shrieking  hamlets  blaze ; 

The  bought  allegiance,  and  the  purchased  praise. 


WILLIAM  WATSON 


97 


False  honor,  and  shameful  glory — 

Of  all  the  evil  whereof  this  is  part, 

How  weary  is  our  heart, 

How  weary  is  our  heart  these  many  days  i 

— The  Yea  r of  Shame. 

ENGLAND  TO  AMERICA. 

O towering  daughter,  Titan  of  the  West, 

Behind  a thousand  leagues  of  foam  secure  ; 

Thou  toward  whom  our  inward  heart  is  pure 
Of  ill  intent ; although  thou  threatenest 
With  most  unfilial  hand  thy  mother's  breast, 

Not  for  one  breathing-space  may  earth  endure 

The  thought  of  war’s  intolerable  cure 

For  such  vague  pains  as  vex  to-day  thy  rest ! 

But  if  thou  hast  more  strength  than  thou  canst  spend 
In  tasks  of  peace,  and  find’st  her  yoke  too  tame, 

Help  us  to  smite  the  cruel,  to  befriend 
The  succorless,  and  put  the  false  to  shame. 

So  shall  the  ages  laud  thee,  and  thy  name 
Be  lovely  among  nations  to  the  end. 

PRELUDE  TO  THE  “HYMN  TO  THE  SEA.” 

Grant,  O regal  in  bounty,  a subtle  and  delicate  largess  ; 
Grant  an  ethereal  alms  out  of  the  wealth  of  thy  soul  ; 
Suffer  a tarrying  minstrel  who  finds  and  fashions  his 
numbers, 

Who,  from  the  commune  of  air,  cages  the  volatile  song. 
Here  to  capture  and  prison  some  fugitive  breath  of  thy 
descant, 

Thine  and  his  own  as  thy  roar  lisped  on  the  lips  of  a shell ; 
Now  while  the  vernal  impulsion  makes  lyrical  all  that 
hath  language, 

While,  through  the  veins  of  the  Earth,  riots  the  ichor 
of  Spring, 

While,  with  throes,  with  raptures,  with  loosing  of  bonds, 
with  unsealings, 

Arrowy  pangs  of  delight,  piercing  the  core  of  the  world, 
Tremors  and  coy  unfoldings,  reluctances,  sweet  agita- 
tions, 

Youth,  irrepressibly  fair,  wakes  like  a wondering  rose. 


WATTERSON,  Henry,  an  American  orator 
and  journalist,  born  at  Washington,  D.  C.,  Feb- 
ruary 1 6,  1840.  He  became  editor  of  the  Demo- 
cratic Review,  in  that  city,  in  1858,  and  of  the 
Nashville  Republican  Banner  in  1861.  During  the 
war  he  served  as  a staff-officer  and  as  chief  of 
scouts  in  the  Confederate  army.  In  1868  he 
founded  the  Louisville  Courier-Journal,  where  he 
soon  became  a national  figure  in  American  jour- 
nalism. He  sat  for  a short  time  (1876-77)  in  Con- 
gress to  fill  a vacancy.  He  has  been  a prolific 
contributor  to  periodicals,  and  is  author  of  Oddi- 
ties of  Southern  Life  and  Character . 

THE  BLUE  AND  THE  GRAY. 

That  promissory  note,  executed  by  me,  subject  to  the 
fndorsement  of  the  city  of  Louisville,  and  discounted 
by  you  in  the  city  of  Pittsburg  a year  ago — it  has  ma- 
tured— and  we  are  here  to  cancel  it  ! You,  who  were  so 
prompt  and  so  generous  about  it,  will  not  be  displeased 
to  learn  that  it  puts  us  to  no  inconvenience  to  pay  it. 
On  the  contrary,  it  having  been  one  of  those  obliga- 
tions on  which  the  interest  compounding  day  by  day 
^?as  designed  to  eat  up  the  principal,  its  discharge 
leaves  us  poor  only  in  the  regret  that  we  may  not  re- 
peat the  transaction  every  twelve  months  and  convert 
this  central  point  of  the  universe  into  a permanent  En- 
campment for  the  Grand  Army  of  the  Republic. 

Except  that  historic  distinctions  have  long  been  ob- 
literated here,  it  might  be  mentioned  that  I appear  be- 
fore you  as  the  representative  alike  of  those  who  wore 
the  blue  and  of  those  who  wore  the  gray  in  that  great 

(98) 


HENRY  WATTERS  ON 


99 


sectional  combat,  which,  whatever  else  it  did  or  did  not, 
left  ro  shadow  upon  American  soldiership,  no  stain 
upon  American  manhood.  But,  in  Kentucky,  the  war 
ended  thirty  years  ago.  Familiar  intercommunication  be- 
tween those  who  fought  in  it  upon  opposing  sides  ; mar- 
riage and  giving  in  marriage  ; the  rearing  of  a common 
progeny ; the  ministrations  of  private  friendship  ; the 
all-subduing  influence  of  home  and  church  and  school, 
of  wife  and  child,  have  culminated  in  such  a closely 
knit  web  of  interest  and  affections  that  none  of  us  cares 
to  disentangle  the  threads  that  compose  it,  and  few  of 
us  could  do  so  if  we  would. 

Here,  at  least,  the  lesson  has  been  taught  and  learned 
that 


4‘  You  cannot  chain  the  eagle, 

And  you  dare  not  harm  the  dove ; 

But  every  gate 
Hate  bars  to  hate 
Will  open  wide  to  love  1 ” 

And  the  flag  ! God  bless  the  flag  ! As  the  heart  of 
McCallum  More  warmed  to  the  tartan,  do  all  hearts 
warm  to  the  flag ! Have  you,  upon  your  round  of  sight- 
seeing, missed  it  hereabout  ? Does  it  make  itself  on 
any  hand  conspicuous  by  its  absence  ? Can  you  doubt 
the  loyal  sincerity  of  those  who  from  house-top  and 
roof-tree  have  thrown  it  to  the  breeze  ? Let  some  sac- 
rilegious hand  be  raised  to  haul  it  down,  and  see  how 
many  gray  beards  who  wore  gray  coats  will  rally  to  it ! 
No,  no,  comrades  ; the  people  en  masse  do  not  deal  in 
subterfuges  ; they  do  not  stoop  to  conquer  ; they  may 
be  wrong  ; they  may  be  perverse  ; but  they  never  dis- 
semble. These  are  honest  flags,  with  honest  hearts  be- 
hind them.  They  are  the  symbols  cf  a nationality  as 
precious  to  us  as  to  you.  They  fly  at  last  as  Webster 
would  have  had  them  fly,  bearing  no  such  mottoes  as 
“ What  is  all  this  worth  ? ” or  “ Liberty  first  and  union 
afterward,”  but  blazing  in  letters  of  living  light  v,.pon 
their  ample  folds,  as  they  float  over  the  sea  and  over 
the  land,  those  words  dear  to  every  American  heart, 
“Union  and  Liberty,  now  and  forever,  one  and  insepa- 
rable.” 


Vol.  XXIV.— 7 


IOO 


HENRY  WATTERS  ON 


And  why  not  ? What  is  left  for  you  and  me  to  cavil 
about,  far  less  to  fight  about?  When  Hamilton  and 
Madison  agreed  in  supporting  a Constitution  wholly 
acceptable  to  neither  of  them,  they  compromised  some 
differences  and  they  left  some  other  differences  open  to 
double  construction  ; and  among  these  latter,  was  the 
exact  relation  of  the  States  to  the  General  Government. 
The  institution  of  African  slavery,  with  its  irreconcila- 
ble conditions,  got  between  the  North  and  the  South, 

and But  I am  not  here  to  recite  the  history  of  the 

United  States.  You  know  what  happened  as  well  as  I 
do,  and  we  all  know  that  there  does  not  remain  a shred 
of  those  old  issues  to  divide  us.  There  is  not  a South- 
ern man  to-day  who  would  recall  slavery  if  he  could. 
There  is  not  a Southern  man  to-day  who  would  lightly 
brook  the  effort  of  a State  to  withdraw  from  the  Union. 
Slavery  is  gone.  Secession  is  dead.  The  Union,  with 
its  system  of  Statehood  still  intact,  survives  ; and  with 
a power  and  glory  among  men  passing  the  dreams  of 
the  fathers  of  the  Republic.  You  and  I may  fold  our 
arms  and  go  to  sleep,  leaving  to  younger  men  to  hold 
and  defend  a property  tenfold  greater  than  that  re- 
ceived by  us,  its  ownership  unclouded  and  its  title-deeds 
recorded  in  Heaven. 

It  is,  therefore,  with  a kind  of  exultation  that  I fling 
open  the  gates  of  this  gateway  to  the  South  ! I bid  you 
welcome  in  the  name  of  the  people,  whose  voice  is  the 
voice  of  God.  You  came,  and  we  resisted  you  ; you 
come,  and  we  greet  you ; for  times  change  and  men 
change  with  them.  You  will  find  here  scarcely  a sign 
of  the  battle  ; not  a reminiscence  of  its  passions.  Grim- 
visaged  war  has  smoothed  his  wrinkled  front,  and 
whichever  way  you  turn  on  either  side,  deepening  as 
you  advance — across  the  Chaplin  Hills,  where  Jackson 
fell,  to  Stone’s  River,  where  Rosy  fought — and  on  to 
Chattanooga  and  Chickamauga  and  over  Missionary 
Ridge,  and  down  by  Resaca  and  Kennesaw,  and  Alla- 
toona,  where  Corse  “ held  the  fort,”  as  a second  time 
you  marched  to  the  sea — pausing  awhile  about  Atlanta 
to  look  with  wonder  on  a scene  risen  as  by  the  hand  of 
enchantment — thence  returning  by  way  of  Franklin  and 
Nashville — you  shall  encounter,  as  you  paa?  thor*  moul. 


HENRY  WATTERSON 


IOl 


dering  heaps,  which  remind  you  of  your  valor  and  trav- 
ail, only  the  magnanimous  spirit  of  dead  heroes,  with 
Grant  and  Sherman,  and  Thomas  and  McPherson  and 
Logan  looking  down  from  the  happy  stars  as  if  repeat- 
ing the  words  of  the  Master— “ Charity  for  all — malice 
toward  none.” 

We,  too,  have  our  graves,  we  too  had  our  heroes ! All, 
all  are  comrades  now  upon  the  other  side,  where  you 
and  I must  shortly  join  them ; blessed,  thrice  blessed, 
we  who  have  lived  to  see  fulfilled  the  Psalmist’s  prophecy 
of  peace : 


“ Peace  in  the  quiet  dales, 

Made  rankly  fertile  by  the  blood  of  mea ; 

Peace  in  the  woodland  and  the  lonely  glen, 

Peace  in  the  peopled  vales. 

“ Peace  in  the  crowded  town  ; 

Peace  in  a thousand  fields  of  waving  grain ; 

Peace  in  the  highway  and  the  flow’ry  lane. 

Peace  o’er  the  wind-swept  down. 

“ Peace  on  the  whirring  marts, 

Peace  where  the  scholar  thinks,  the  hunter  roams. 

Peace,  God  of  peace,  peace,  peace  in  all  our  homes. 

And  all  our  hearts  ! ” 

— < Speech  Delivered  at  the  National  G.  A.  R. 
Encampment,  at  Louisville , Ky in  Septem- 
ber, iSpj. 

THE  NEW  SOUTH. 

Xt  was  not,  however,  to  hear  of  banks  and  bankers 
and  banking  that  you  did  me  the  honor  to  call  me  be- 
fore you,  I am  told  that  to-day  you  are  considering 
that  problem  which  has  so  disturbed  the  politicians — 
the  South— and  that  you  wish  me  to  talk  to  you  about 
the  South.  The  South  ! The  South  ! It  is  no  problem 
at  all.  I thank  God  that  at  last  we  can  say,  with  truth, 
it  is  simply  a geographical  expression.  The  whole 
story  of  the  South  may  be  summed  up  in  a sentence  : 
She  was  rich,  and  she  lost  her  riches  ; she  was  poor  and 
in  bondage  ; she  was  set  free  and  she  had  to  go  to 
work  ; she  went  to  work,  and  she  is  richer  than  ever  be- 


102 


HENRY  WATTERSON 


fore.  You  see  it  was  a ground-hog  case.  The  soil  was 
here,  the  climate  was  here,  but  along  with  them  was 
a curse — the  curse  of  slavery.  God  passed  the  rod  across 
the  land  and  smote  the  people.  Then  in  his  goodness 
and  mercy,  he  waved  the  wand  of  enchantment  and  lo, 
like  a flower,  his  blessing  burst  forth  ! Indeed  may  the 
South  say,  as  in  the  experience  of  men  it  is  rare  for  any 
to  say  with  perfect  sincerity:  “ Sweet  are  the  uses  of 
adversity/' 

The  South  never  knew  what  independence  meant  un- 
til she  was  taught  by  subjection  to  subdue  herself.  We 
lived  from  hand  to  mouth.  We  had  our  debts  and  our 
niggers.  Under  the  old  system  we  paid  our  debts  and 
walloped  our  niggers.  Under  the  new  system  we  pay 
our  niggers  and  wallop  our  debts.  We  have  no  longer 
any  slaves,  but  we  have  no  longer  any  debts,  and  can 
exclaim,  with  the  old  darkey  at  the  camp-meeting,  who, 
whenever  he  got  happy  went  about  shouting,  “ Bless 
the  Lord  ! I’m  gittin’  fatter  an’  fatter  ! ” 

The  truth  is,  that  behind  the  great  ruffle  the  South 
wore  to  its  shirt  there  lay  concealed  a superb  manhood. 
That  this  manhood  was  perverted  there  is  no  doubt. 
That  it  wasted  its  energies  upon  trifles  is  beyond  dis- 
pute. That  it  took  a pride  in  cultivating  what  are  called 
“ the  vices  of  a gentleman,”  I am  afraid  must  be  ad- 
mitted. But,  at  heart,  it  was  sound  ; from  that  heart 
flowed  honest  Anglo-Saxon  blood,  and  when  it  had  to 
lay  aside  its  “ store-clothes  ” and  put  on  the  homespun, 
it  was  equal  to  the  emergency  ; and  the  women  of  the 
South  took  their  place  by  the  side  of  the  men  of  the 
South,  and,  with  spinning-wheel  and  ploughshare,  to- 
gether they  made  a stand  against  the  wolf  at  the  door. 
That  was  fifteen  years  ago,  and  to-day  there  is  not  a 
reward  offered  in  a single  Southern  State  for  wolf- 
skins. The  fact  is,  the  very  wolves  themselves  have 
got  ashamed  and  gone  to  work. 

I beg  you  to  believe  that,  in  saying  this,  my  purpose 
is  neither  to  amuse  nor  mislead  you.  Although  my  words 
may  seem  to  carry  with  them  an  unbusiness-like  levity, 
I assure  you  that  my  design  is  wholly  business-like. 
You  can  see  for  yourselves  what  the  South  has  done ; 
what  the  South  can  do.  If  all  this  has  been  achieved 


ffEATRY  WATTERSON 


103 


without  credit,  and  without  your  powerful  aid — and  i 
am  now  addressing  myself  to  the  North  and  East,  which 
have  feared  to  come  South  with  their  money — what 
might  not  be  achieved  if  the  vast  aggregation  of  capital 
in  the  fiscal  centres  should  add  this  land  of  wine,  milk, 
and  honey  to  their  field  of  investment,  and  give  us  the 
same  cheap  rates  which  are  enjoyed  by  nearer  but  not 
safer  borrowers  ! The  future  of  the  South  is  not  a wh*t 
less  assured  than  the  future  of  the  West.  Why  should 
money  which  is  freely  loaned  to  Iowa  and  Illinois  be 
refused  to  Alabama  and  Mississippi  ? I perfectly  un- 
derstand that  business  is  business,  and  that  capital  is  as 
unsectional  as  unsentimental.  I am  speaking  from  nei- 
ther spirit.  You  have  money  to  loan  ; we  have  a great 
country  to  develop. 

We  need  the  money ; you  can  make  a profit  off  the 
development.  When  I say  that  we  need  money,  I do 
mean  the  sort  of  money  once  demanded  by  an  old 
Georgia  farmer,  who  in  the  early  days  came  up  to  Mil- 
ledgeville  to  see  General  Robert  Toombs,  at  the  time 
a director  of  the  State  Bank.  “ Robert,”  says  he,  “ the 
folks  down  our  way  air  in  need  of  more  money.”  The  pro- 
fane Robert  replied  : “ Well,  how  in  are  they  going 

to  get  it  ? ” “ Why,”  says  the  farmer,  “ can’t  you  stomp 
it  ? ” “ Suppose  we  do  stomp  it,  how  are  we  going  to  re^ 

deem  it?”  “ Exactly,  Robert,  exactly.  That  was  just 
what  I was  coming  to.  You  see  the  folks  down  our  way 
air  agin  redemption.”  We  want  good  money,  honest 
money,  hard  money,  money  that  will  redeem  itself. 

We  have  given  hostages  to  fortune  and  our  works  are 
before  you.  I know  that  capital  is  proverbially  timid. 
But  what  are  you  afraid  of  ? Is  it  our  cotton  that 
alarms  you  ? or  our  corn  ? or  our  sugar  ? Perhaps  it  is 
our  coal  and  iron.  Without  you,  in  truth,  many  of 
these  products  must  make  slow  progress,  whilst  others 
will  continue  to  lie  hid  in  the  bowels  of  the  earth. 
With  you  the  South  will  bloom  as  a garden,  and  sparkle 
as  a gold-mine;  for,  whether  you  tickle  her  fertile 
plains  with  a straw,  or  apply  a more  violent  titillation 
to  her  fat  mountain-sides,  she  is  ready  to  laugh  a har- 
vest of  untold  riches. 

I am  not  a banker,  and  it  would  be  an  affectation  io 


BE  FRY  WATTRRSOF 


?£»4 

me  to  undertake  to  advise  you  in  your  own  business. 
But  there  is  a point  which  relates  to  the  safe  invest* 
ment  of  money,  on  which  I can  venture  to  express  an 
opinion  with  some  assurance— that  is  the  political 
stability,  involving  questions  of  law  and  order  in  the 
South.  My  belief  is  that  life  and  property  are  as  secure 
in  the  South  as  they  are  in  New  England.  I am  cer- 
tain that  men  are  at  least  as  safe  in  Kentucky  and  Tern 
nessee  as  women  seem  to  be  in  Connecticut.  The  truth 
is,  the  war  is  over  and  the  country  is  whole  again.  The 
people,  always  homogeneous,  have  a common  National 
interest.  For  my  own  part,  I have  never  believed  in 
isothermal  lines,  air-lines,  and  water-lines  separating 
distinct  races.  I no  more  believe  that  that  river  yon- 
der, dividing  Indiana  and  Kentucky,  marks  off  two  dis- 
tinct species,  than  I believe  that  the  great  Hudson,  flow- 
ing through  the  State  of  New  York,  marks  off  distinct 
species.  Such  theories  only  live  in  the  fancy  of  morbid 
minds.  We  are  all  one  people.  Commercially,  finan- 
cially, morally,  we  are  one  people.  Divide  as  we  will 
into  parties,  we  are  one  people.  It  is  this  sense  which 
gives  a guarantee  of  peace  and  order  at  the  South,  and 
offers  a sure  and  lasting  escort  to  all  the  capital  which 
may  come  to  us  for  investment. — From  a Speech  De- 
livered Before  the  National  Bankers ’ Convention  at  Louis- 
ville, Ky.%  October  u9 188$. 


WATTS,  Isaac,  an  English  dissenting  clergy- 
man and  hymnologist,  born  at  Southampton,  July 
1 7,  1674;  died  near  London,  November  25,  1748. 
He  was  a precocious  child;  composed  verses,  as 
we  are  told,  before  he  was  three  years  old,  began 
to  study  Latin  at  four,  and  could  read  easy  authors 
at  five.  Being  a Dissenter  he  could  not  enter  one 
of  the  Universities,  but  received  a thorough  edu- 
cation, and  became  tutor  in  a private  family.  In 
1698  he  was  chosen  assistant  minister  of  the  Inde- 
pendent congregation  in  Mark  Lane,  London,  of 
which  he  became  pastor  in  1702.  Owing  to  feeble 
health  he  resigned  this  charge,  and  in  1712  was  in- 
vited by  Sir  Thomas  Abney,  of  Abney  Park,  near 
London,  to  enter  his  family  circle.  Here  he 
lived  during  the  remaining  thirty-six  years  of 
his  life,  preaching  not  unfrequently,  and  writing 
many  books  in  prose  and  verse.  His  works  com- 
prise about  a dozen  octavo  volumes.  The  greater 
portion  of  his  prose  writings  consists  of  sermons 
and  theological  treatises.  He,  however,  wrote 
several  short  treatises  on  astronomy  and  geog- 
raphy ; and  his  Logic , and  its  continuation  in  The 
Improvement  of  the  Mind , are  still  esteemed  as 
standard  works.  His  poems  are  all  of  the  religious 
character,  many  of  them  written  for  children.  He 
versified  the  entire  Book  of  Psalms , and  many  of 
his  Hymns  find  a place  in  the  hymn-books  of  all 
denominations  of  Christians. 

Uos) 


io6 


ISAAC  WATTS 


A PROBLEM  IN  ETHICS. 

In  many  things  which  we  do,  we  ought  not  only  to 
consider  the  mere  naked  action  itself,  but  the  persons 
toward  whom,  the  time  when,  the  place  where,  the 
manner  how,  the  end  for  which  the  action  was  done, 
together  with  the  effects  that  must  or  may  follow  ; and 
all  other  surrounding  circumstances  must  necessarily 
be  taken  into  our  view  in  order  to  determine  whether 
the  action,  which  is  indifferent  in  itself,  be  either  lawful 
or  unlawful,  good  or  evil,  wise  or  foolish,  decent  or  in- 
decent, proper  or  improper,  as  it  is  so  circumstantiated. 
Let  me  give  a plain  instance  for  the  illustration  of  this 
matter : 

Mario  kills  a dog — which,  considered  in  itself,  seems 
to  be  an  indifferent  action.  Now,  the  dog  was  Ti- 
mon’s,  and  not  his  own  : this  makes  it  look  unlawful. 
But  Timon  bade  him  do  it : this  gives  it  an  appearance 
of  lawfulness.  Again,  it  was  done  at  church,  and  in 
time  of  divine  service  : these  circumstances,  added,  cast 
on  it  an  air  of  irreligion.  But  the  dog  flew  at  Mario, 
and  put  him  in  danger  of  his  life  : this  relieves  the 
seeming  impiety  of  the  action.  Yet  Mario  might  have 
escaped  thence  : therefore  the  action  appears  to  be  im- 
proper. But  the  dog  was  known  to  be  mad : this 
further  circumstance  makes  it  almost  necessary  that 
the  dog  should  be  slain,  lest  he  should  worry  the  assem- 
bly, and  do  much  mischief.  Yet  again,  Mario  killed 
him  with  a pistol  which  he  happened  to  have  in  his 
pocket  since  yesterday’s  journey ; now  hereby  the 
whole  congregation  was  terrified  and  discomposed,  and 
divine  worship  was  broken  off  : this  carries  an  appear- 
ance of  great  indecency  and  impropriety  in  it.  But 
after  all,  when  we  consider  a further  circumstance,  that 
Mario,  being  thus  violently  assaulted  by  a mad  dog,  had 
no  way  of  escaping,  and  had  no  other  weapon  about 
him,  it  seems  to  take  away  all  the  color  of  impropriety, 
indecency,  or  unlawfulness,  and  to  allow  that  the  pres- 
ervation of  one  or  many  lives  will  justify  the  act  as 
wise  and  good.  Now  all  these  concurrent  appendices 
of  the  action  ought  to  be  surveyed  in  order  to  pro- 


ISAAC  WATTS 


107 


nounce  with  justice  and  accuracy  concerning  it. — The 
Improvement  of  the  Mind, 

A CRADLE  HYMN. 

(Abbreviated  from  the  original.) 

Hush!  my  dear,  lie  still,  and  slumber; 

Holy  angels  guard  thy  bed  ! 

Heavenly  blessings  without  number 
Gently  falling  on  thy  head. 

Sleep,  my  babe  ; thy  food  and  raiment, 

House  and  home,  thy  friends  provide ; 

All  without  thy  care  or  payment, 

All  thy  wants  are  well  supplied. 

How  much  better  thou’rt  attended 
Than  the  Son  of  God  could  be, 

When  from  heaven  He  descended, 

And  became  a child  like  thee. 

Soft  and  easy  is  thy  cradle  : 

Coarse  and  hard  thy  Saviour  lay  : 

When  His  birthplace  was  a stable, 

And  His  softest  bed  was  hay. 

See  the  kinder  shepherds  round  Him, 

Telling  wonders  from  the  sky! 

There  they  sought  Him,  there  they  found  Him, 
With  His  virgin  mother  by. 

-See  the  lovely  Babe  a-dressing  ; 

Lovely  Infant,  how  he  smiled  ! 

When  He  wept,  the  mother’s  blessing 
Soothed  and  hushed  the  holy  Child. 

Lo,  He  slumbers  in  His  manger, 

Where  the  horned  oxen  feed ; 

Peace,  my  darling,  here’s  no  danger, 

Here’s  no  ox  anear  thy  bed. 

May’st  thou  live  to  know  and  fear  Him, 

Trust  and  love  Him  all  thy  days; 

Then  go  dwell  forever  near  Him, 

See  His  face  and  sing  His  praise  ! 


ISAAC  WATTS 


I08 


I could  give  thee  thousand  kisses. 

Hoping  what  I most  desire  ; 

Not  a mother’s  fondest  wishes 
Can  to  greater  joys  aspire. 

THE  EARNEST  STUDENT. 

M Infinite  Truth,  the  life  of  my  desires, 

Come  from  the  sky,  and  join  thyself  to  me : 

I’m  tired  with  hearing,  and  this  reading  tires; 
But  never  tired  of  telling  thee, 

Tis  thy  fair  face  alone  my  spirit  burns  to  see. 

“ Speak  to  my  soul,  alone  ; no  other  hand 
Shall  mark  my  path  out  with  delusive  art ; 

All  nature,  silent  in  His  presence,  stand  ; 
Creatures,  be  dumb  at  His  command, 

And  leave  His  single  voice  to  whisper  to  my  heart. 

M Retire,  my  soul,  within  thyself  retire, 

Away  from  sense  and  every  outward  show  ; 
Now  let  my  thoughts  to  loftier  themes  aspire ; 
My  knowledge  now  on  wheels  of  fire, 

May  mount  and  spread  above,  surveying  all  below.** 

The  Lord  grows  lavish  of  His  heavenly  light, 
And  pours  whole  floods  on  such  a mind  as  this 
Fled  from  the  eyes,  she  gains  a piercing  sight, 
She  dives  into  the  infinite, 

And  sees  unutterable  things  in  that  unknown  abyss. 

TRUE  RICHES. 

I am  not  concerned  to  know 
What  to-morrow  fate  will  do  ; 

Tis  enough  that  I can  say 
Fve  possessed  myself  to-day  ; 

Then  if  haply  midnight  death 
Seize  my  flesh,  and  stop  my  breath. 

Yet  to-morrow  I shall  be 
Heir  of  the  best  part  of  me. 

Glittering  stones  and  golden  thing*. 
Wealth  and  honors,  that  have  wing* 


ISAAC  WATTS 


Ever  fluttering  to  be  gone, 

I could  never  call  my  own. 

Riches  that  the  world  bestows, 

She  can  take,  and  I can  lose  ; 

But  the  treasures  that  are  mine 
Lie  afar  beyond  her  line. 

When  I view  my  spacious  soul. 

And  survey  myself  a whole, 

And  enjoy  myself  alone, 

I’m  a kingdom  of  my  own. 

I’ve  a mighty  part  within 
That  the  world  hath  never  seen, 
Rich  as  Eden’s  happy  ground, 

And  with  choicer  plenty  crowned. 
Here  on  all  the  shining  boughs 
Knowledge  fair  and  useful  grows. 
Here  are  thoughts  of  larger  growth 
Ripening  into  solid  truth  ; 

Fruits  refined  of  noble  taste — 
Seraphs  feed  on  such  repast, 

Here,  in  green  and  shady  grove, 
Streams  of  pleasure  mix  with  love  ; 
There,  beneath  the  smiling  skies, 
Hills  of  contemplation  rise  ; 

Now  upon  some  shining  top 
Angels  light,  and  call  me  up  ; 

I rejoice  to  raise  my  feet. 

Both  rejoice  when  there  we  meet. 

There  are  endless  beauties  more. 
Earth  has  no  resemblance  for  ; 
Nothing  like  them  round  the  pole  ; 
Nothing  can  describe  the  soul.  . , 

Broader  ’tis  and  brighter  far 
Than  the  golden  Indies  are  ; 

Ships  that  trace  the  watery  stage 
Cannot  coast  it  in  an  age  ; 

Harts  or  horses  strong  and  fleet, 
Had  they  wings  to  help  their  feet, 
Could  not  run  it  half-way  o’er 
In  ten  thousand  days  and  more. 

Yet  the  silly,  wandering  mind, 
Loath  to  be  too  much  confined. 


no 


ISAAC  WATTS 


Roves  and  takes  her  daily  tours, 

Coasting  round  the  narrow  shores — 
Narrow  shores  of  flesh  and  sense — 
Picking  shells  and  pebbles  thence  ; 

Or  she  sits  at  Fancy’s  door, 

Calling  shapes  and  shadows  to  her; 
Foreign  visits  still  receiving, 

And  to  herself  a stranger  living. 

Never,  never  would  she  buy 
Indian  dust  or  Tyrian  dye, 

Never  trade  abroad  for  more, 

If  she  saw  her  native  shore  ; 

If  her  inward  worth  were  known, 

She  might  ever  live  alone. 

INSIGNIFICANT  EXISTENCE. 

There  are  a number  of  us  creep 
Into  this  world,  to  eat  and  sleep  ; 

And  know  no  reason  why  we’re  born, 

But  only  to  consume  the  corn, 

Devour  the  cattle,  fowl,  and  fish, 

And  leave  behind  an  empty  dish. 

The  crows  and  ravens  do  the  same — 
Unlucky  birds  of  hateful  name  ; 

Ravens  or  crows  might  fill  their  place 
And  swallow  corn  and  carcasses. 

Then  if  their  tombstone,  when  they  die. 
Be  n’t  taught  to  flatter  and  to  lie, 

There’s  nothing  better  will  be  said 
Than  that  “ they’ve  eat  up  all  their  bread 
Drunk  up  their  drink,  and  gone  to  bed.” 

THERE  IS  A LAND  OF  PURE  DELIGHT. 

There  is  a land  of  pure  delight, 

Where  saints  immortal  reign  ; 
Infinite  day  excludes  the  night, 

And  pleasures  banish  pain. 

There  everlasting  Spring  abides, 

And  never-withering  flowers  ; 

Death,  like  a narrow  sea,  divides 
This  heavenly  land  from  ours. 


ISAAC  WATTS 


in 


Sweet  fields  beyond  the  swelling  flood 
Stand  dressed  in  living  green  ; 

So  to  the  Jews  old  Canaan  stood, 

While  Jordan  rolled  between. 

But  timorous  mortals  start  and  shrink 
To  cross  this  narrow  sea, 

And  linger,  shivering,  on  the  brink, 

And  fear  to  launch  away. 

Oh  ! could  we  make  our  doubts  remove — 
Those  gloomy  doubts  that  rise — 

And  see  the  Canaan  that  we  love 
With  unbeclouded  eyes  ; 

Could  we  but  climb  where  Moses  stood, 
And  view  the  landscape  o’er, 

Not  Jordan’s  stream  nor  Death’s  cold  flood 
Should  fright  us  from  the  shore. 

MY  DEAR  REDEEMER. 

My  dear  Redeemer,  and  my  Lord ! 

I read  my  duty  in  Thy  word  ; 

But  in  Thy  life  the  law  appears, 

Drawn  out  in  living  characters. 

Such  was  Thy  truth,  and  such  Thy  zeal, 
Such  deference  to  Thy  Father’s  will, 

Such  love,  and  meekness  so  divine, 

I would  transcribe,  and  make  them  mine. 

Cold  mountains,  and  the  midnight  air, 
Witnessed  the  fervor  of  Thy  prayer  ; 

The  desert  Thy  temptations  knew — 

Thy  conflict,  and  Thy  victory,  too. 

Be  Thou  my  pattern  ; make  me  bear 
More  of  Thy  gracious  image  here  ; 

Then  God,  the  judge,  shall  own  my  name 
Among  the  followers  of  the  Lamb. 


112 


ISAAC  WATTS 


FROM  ALL  THAT  DWELL. 

From  all  that  dwell  below  the  skies 
Let  the  Creator’s  praise  arise  ; 

Let  the  Redeemer’s  name  be  sung 
Through  every  land  by  every  tongue  ! 

Eternal  are  Thy  mercies,  Lord  ; 

Eternal  truth  attends  Thy  word  ; 

Thy  praise  shall  sound  from  shore  to  shore, 
Till  suns  shall  rise  and  set  no  more. 

before  jehovah’s  awful  throne. 

Before  Jehovah’s  awful  throne, 

Ye  nations,  bow  with  sacred  joy ; 

Know  that  the  Lord  is  God  alone ; 

He  can  create,  and  He  destroy. 

His  sovereign  power,  without  our  aid, 

Made  us  of  clay,  and  formed  us  men  ; 

And  when,  like  wandering  sheep,  we  strayed, 
He  brought  us  to  His  fold  again. 

We  are  His  people ; we  His  care, — 

Our  souls  and  all  our  mortal  frame  ; 

What  lasting  honors  shall  we  rear, 

Almighty  Maker,  to  Thy  name  ? 

We’ll  crowd  Thy  gates  with  thankful  songs  ; 

High  as  the  heaven  our  voices  raise  ; 

All  Earth,  with  her  ten  thousand  tongues, 
Shall  fill  Thy  courts  with  sounding  praise. 

Wide  as  the  world  is  Thy  command  ; 

Vast  as  eternity  Thy  love  ; 

Firm  as  a rock  Thy  truth  shall  stand 
When  rolling  years  shall  cease  to  move. 

UNVEIL  THY  BOSOM,  FAITHFUL  TOMB. 

Unveil  thy  bosom,  faithful  tomb  ; 

Take  this  new  treasure  to  thy  trust, 

And  give  these  sacred  relics  room 
To  slumber  in  the  silent  dust. 


ISAAC  WATTS 


ti3 


Nor  pain,  nor  grief,  nor  anxious  fear 
Invade  thy  bounds ; nor  mortal  woes 
Can  reach  the  peaceful  sleeper  here. 

While  angels  watch  thy  soft  repose. 

So  Jesus  slept ; God’s  dying  Son 
Passed  through  the  grave,  and  blest  the  bed  • 
Rest  here,  blest  saint,  till  from  his  throne 
The  morning  break,  and  pierce  the  shade. 

Break  from  His  throne,  illustrious  morn ; 

Attend,  O Earth,  His  sovereign  word ; 

Restore  Thy  trust ; a glorious  form 
Shall  then  arise  to  meet  the  Lord. 

A SUMMER  EVENING. 

How  fine  has  the  day  been  ! how  bright  was  the  sun  I 
How  lovely  and  joyful  the  course  that  he  run, 
Though  he  rose  in  a mist  when  his  race  he  begun, 
And  there  followed  some  droppings  of  rain  ! 

But  now  the  fair  traveller’s  come  to  the  west, 

His  rays  are  all  gold,  and  his  beauties  are  best : 

He  paints  the  sky  gay  as  he  sinks  to  his  rest, 

And  foretells  a bright  rising  again. 

Just  such  is  the  Christian  ; his  course  he  begins, 

Like  the  sun  in  a mist,  when  he  mourns  for  his  sins, 
And  melts  into  tears  ; then  he  breaks  out  and  shines, 
And  travels  his  heavenly  way  : 

But  when  he  comes  nearer  to  finish  his  race, 

Like  a fine  setting  sun,  he  looks  richer  in  grace, 

And  gives  a sure  hope,  at  the  end  of  his  days, 

Of  rising  in  brighter  array. 


WAYLAND,  Francis,  an  American  educatol 
and  miscellaneous  writer,  President  of  Brown 
University,  born  in  New  York,  March  u,  1796; 
died  at  Providence,  R.  1.,  September  30,  1865.  He 
was  graduated  at  Union  College  in  1813,  and 
studied  medicine,  but  soon  after  pursued  a theo- 
logical course  at  Andover.  After  a four  years’ 
tutorship  at  Union  College,  and  a pastorate  in 
Boston,  he  was  elected,  in  1826,  Professor  of 
Mathematics  and  Natural  History  at  Union,  and 
the  next  year  assumed  the  presidency  of  Brown 
University,  retiring,  after  twenty-eight  years  of 
service,  to  a pastorate  in  Providence.  He  pub- 
lished Elements  of  Moral  Science  (1835);  Elements 
of  Political  Economy  (1837) ; Limitations  of  Human 
Reason  ( 1 840) ; Thoughts  on  the  Collegiate  System  in 
the  United  States  (1842),  recommending  a modern- 
ization of  the  old  curriculum ; Christianity  and 
Slavery  (1845);  Life  of  Adonir am  Judson  (1853); 
Intellectual  Philosophy  (1854)  ; Letters  on  the  Ministry 
(1863),  also  occasional  sermons  and  addresses. 

“Asa  thinker  and  expounder  Dr.  Wayland  is 
justly  regarded  as  the  head  of  his  denomination,” 
says  Henry  T.  Tuckerman.  “ In  many  essentia) 
particulars  he  is  to  the  American  what  John  Fos, 
ter  was  to  the  English  Baptists.” 

“ Few  works  which  have  so  little  ornament  are 
as  attractive  and  agreeable  as  those  of  this  abl« 


FRANC/S  WAYLAMB 


1 15 

thinker/*  says  R.  W,  Griswold.  **  They  have  the 
natural  charm  which  belongs  to  the  display  of  ac- 
tive, various,  and  ready  strength.  Everything 
that  proceeds  from  his  pen  has  a character  of 
originality.*’ 

Of  The  Duties  of  an  American  Citizen , Jared 
Sparks  says:  “ It  is  seldom  that  we  have  met  with 
sounder  views,  or  with  sentiments  more  just  and 
liberal  on  some  important  topics  than  are  con- 
tained in  these  discourses.  . . . They  are  the 

production  of  a vigorous  mind  and  a good  heart, 
creditable  to  the  talents  and  religious  motives  of 
the  author,  and  form  a valuable  addition  to  the 
stock  of  our  literature.” 

The  following  extract  is  from  a sermon  com- 
memorating Hon.  Nicholas  Brown,  after  whom 
Brown  University  was  named. 

LIVING  WORTHILY. 

As  the  stranger  stands  beneath  the  dome  of  St.  Paul’s, 
or  treads,  with  religious  awe,  the  silent  aisles  of  West~ 
minster  Abbey,  the  sentiment  which  is  breathed  in  every 
object  around  him  is  the  utter  emptiness  of  sublunary 
glory.  The  most  magnificent  nation  that  the  world  has 
ever  seen  has  here  exhausted  every  effort  to,  render 
illustrious  her  sons  who  have  done  worthily.  The  fine 
arts,  obedient  to  private  affection  or  public  gratitude, 
have  embodied,  in  every  form,  the  finest  conceptions  of 
which  their  age  was  capable.  In  years  long  gone  by, 
each  one  of  these  monuments  has  been  watered  by  the 
tears  of  the  widow,  the  orphan,  or  the  patriot.  But 
generations  have  passed  away,  and  mourners  and 
mourned  have  sunk  together  into  forgetfulness.  The 
aged  crone,  or  the  smooth-tongued  beadle,  as  now  he 
hurries  you  through  aisle  and  chapel,  utters  with  meas- 
ured cadence  and  unmeaning  tone,  for  the  thousand* ^ 
Vql.XXIV,— * ...  ^ 


Ii6 


FRANCIS  W A V LAND 


time,  the  name  and  lineage  of  the  once  honored  dead  ; 
and  then  gladly  dismisses  you,  to  repeat  again  his  well- 
conned  lesson  to  another  group  of  idle  passers-by. 
Such,  in  its  most  august  form,  is  all  the  immortality  that 
matter  can  confer.  Impressive  and  venerable  though  it 
be,  it  is  the  impressiveness  of  a solemn  and  mortifying 
failure.  It  is  by  what  we  ourselves  have  done,  and  not 
by  what  others  have  done  for  us,  that  we  shall  be  re- 
membered by  after  ages.  It  is  by  thought  that  has 
aroused  my  intellect  from  its  slumbers,  which  has  “ given 
lustre  to  virtue,  and  dignity  to  truth,”  or  by  those  ex- 
amples which  have  inflamed  my  soul  with  the  love  of 
goodness,  and  not  by  means  of  sculptured  marble,  that 
I hold  communion  with  Shakespeare  and  Milton,  with 
Johnson  and  Burke,  with  Howard  and  Wilberforce. 

It  is  then  obvious,  that  if  we  desire  to  live  worthily, 
if  we  wish  to  fulfil  the  great  purposes  for  which  we 
were  created,  we  must  leave  the  record  of  our  existence 
inscribed  on  the  ever-during  spirit.  The  impression 
there  can  never  be  effaced.  “ Time,  which  obliterates 
nations  and  the  record  of  their  existence,”  only  renders 
the  lineaments  which  we  trace  on  mind  deeper  and  more 
legible.  From  the  very  principles  of  our  social  nature, 
moral  and  intellectual  character  multiplies  indefinitely 
its  own  likeness.  This,  then,  is  the  appropriate  field  of 
labor  for  the  immortal  and  ever-growing  soul. 

I know  that  the  power  thus  given  to  us  is  frequently 
abused.  I am  aware  that  the  most  gifted  intellect  has 
frequently  been  prostituted  to  the  dissemination  of  error 
and  that  the  highest  capacity  for  action  has  been  de- 
voted to  the  perpetration  of  wrong.  It  is  melancholy 
beyond  expression  to  behold  an  immortal  spirit,  by  pre- 
cept and  example,  urging  forward  its  fellows  to  rebel- 
lion  against  God.  But  it  is  some  alleviation  to  the  pain 
of  such  a contemplation  to  remember  that  in  the  con- 
stitution of  our  nature  a limit  has  been  fixed  to  the 
triumph  of  evil.  Falsity  in  theory  is  everywhere  con- 
fronted by  the  facts  which  present  themselves  to  every 
man’s  observation.  A lie  has  not  power  to  change  the 
ordinances  of  God.  Every  day  discloses  its  utter  worth- 
lessness, until  it  fades  away  from  our  recollection,  and 
is  numbered  among  the  things  that  were.  The  indisspl- 


FRANCIS  WAY  LAND 


TT7 

uble  connection  which  our  Creator  has  established  be- 
tween vice  and  misery  tends  also  continually  to  arrest 
the  progress  of  evil,  and  to  render  odious  whatever 
would  render  evil  attractive.  The  conscience  of  man 
himself,  when  once  the  storm  of  passion  has  subsided, 
stamps  it  with  moral  disapprobation.  The  remorse  of 
his  own  bosom  forbids  him  to  reveal  to  another  his  own 
atrocious  principles.  The  innate  affections  of  the  heart 
teach  us  to  shield  those  whom  we  love  from  the  con- 
taminations of  vice.  Hence,  the  effect  of  wicked  ex- 
ample and  of  impure  conceptions,  meeting  with  cease- 
less resistance  in  the  social  and  moral  impulsions  of  the 
soul,  becomes  from  age  to  age  less  apparent.  Men  are 
willing  that  such  examples  should  be  forgotten,  and 
they  sink  into  oblivion.  Thus  is  it  that,  in  the  words  of 
inspiration,  “ the  memory  of  the  just  is  blessed,  but  the 
name  of  the  wicked  shall  rot.” 

It  is  then  manifest  that  we  accomplish  the  highest 
purposes  of  our  existence,  not  merely  by  exerting  the 
power  which  God  has  given  us  upon  the  spirit  of  man, 
but  by  exerting  that  power  for  the  purpose  of  promot- 
ing his  happiness  and  confirming  his  virtue. — Discourse 
in  Brown  University , November  j,  1841. 

THE  PHILOSOPHY  OF  ANALOGY. 

You  observe  that  I speak  of  the  science  of  analogy 
as  something  which  is  yet  to  be.  It  does  not  now  ex- 
ist, but  it  must  exist  soon.  He  who  shall  create  it  will 
descend  to  posterity  with  a glory  in  nowise  inferior  to 
that  of  Bacon  or  of  Newton.  He  who  would  complete 
such  a work  must  be  acquainted  with  the  whole  circle 
of  the  sciences,  and  be  familiar  with  their  history  ; he 
must  examine  and  analyze  all  the  circumstances  of  every 
important  discovery,  and,  from  the  facts  thus  developed, 
point  out  the  laws  by  which  is  governed  the  yet  unex- 
plained process  of  original  investigation.  When  God 
shall  have  sent  that  genius  upon  earth  who  was  born  to 
accomplish  this  mighty  labor,  then  one  of  the  greatest 
obstacles  will  have  been  removed  to  our  acquiring  an 
unlimited  control  over  all  the  agents  of  nature. 

But,  passing  this  first  part  of  the  subject,  I remark 


Ii8 


FRANCIS  IV  A YLAND 


that,  whenever  the  laws  of  such  a science  shall  have 
been  discovered,  I think  that  they  will  be  found  to  rest 
upon  the  following  self-evident  principles  : 

First — A part  of  any  system  which  is  the  work  of  an 
intelligent  agent  is  similar,  so  far  as  the  principles 
which  it  involves  are  concerned,  to  the  whole  of  that 
system. 

And,  secondly — The  work  of  an  intelligent  and  moral 
being  must  bear,  in  all  its  lineaments,  the  traces  of  the 
character  of  its  author.  And,  hence,  he  will  use  an- 
alogy the  most  skilfully  who  is  most  thoroughly  imbued 
with  the  spirit  of  the  system,  and  at  the  same  time  mos* 
deeply  penetrated  with  a conviction  of  the  attributes  of 
the  First  Cause  of  all  things. 

To  illustrate  this  by  a single  remark  : Suppose  I 

should  present  before  you  one  of  the  paintings  of  Rap  #- 
ael,  and,  covering  by  far  the  greater  part  of  it  with  a 
screen,  ask  you  to  proceed  with  the  work  and  designate 
where  the  next  lines  should  be  drawn.  It  is  evident 
that  no  one  but  a painter  need  even  make  the  attempt; 
and  of  painters  he  would  be  the  most  likely  to  succeed 
who  had  become  best  acquainted  with  the  genius  of 
Raphael,  and  had  most  thoroughly  meditated  upon  the 
manner  in  which  that  genius  had  displayed  itself  in  the 
work  before  him.  So,  of  the  system  of  the  universe  we 
see  but  a part.  All  the  rest  is  hidden  from  our  view. 
He  will,  however,  most  readily  discover  where  the 
next  lines  are  drawn  who  is  most  thoroughly  acquaint- 
ed with  the  character  of  the  author,  and  who  has  ob- 
served, with  the  greatest  accuracy,  the  manner  in  which 
that  character  is  displayed,  in  that  portion  of  the  system 
which  he  has  condescended  to  reveal  to  us. 

All  this  is  confirmed  by  the  successive  efforts  of  mind 
which  resulted  in  the  greatest  of  Sir  Isaac  Newton’s 
discoveries.  ...  I think  it  self-evident  that  this 
first  germ  of  the  system  of  the  universe  would  never 
have  been  suggested  to  any  man  wrhose  mind  had,  not 
been  filled  with  exalted  views  of  the  greatness  of  the 
Creator,  and  who  had  not  diligently  contemplated  the 
mode  in  which  those  attributes  were  displayed  in  that 
part  of  his  works  which  science  had  already  discovered 
to  us. 


FRANCIS  WAYLAND 


And  if  this  distinction  be  just,  it  will  lead  us  to  di- 
vide philosophers  into  those  who  have  been  eminent  in 
attainment  in  those  sciences  which  are  instruments  of 
investigation  ; and  those  who,  to  these  acquisitions,  have 
added  unusual  skill  in  foretelling  where  these  instruments 
could,  with  the  greatest  success,  be  applied.  Among  the 
ancients,  probably,  Aristotle  belonged  to  the  former,  and 
Pythagoras  and  Archimedes  to  the  latter  class.  Among 
the  moderns  I think  the  infidel  philosophers  gener- 
ally will  be  found  to  have  distinguished  themselves  by 
the  accurate  use  of  the  sciences,  and  Christian  philoso- 
phers by  the  additional  glory  of  foretelling  when  and 
how  the  sciences  may  be  used.  I am  not  aware  that 
infidelity  has  presented  to  the  world  any  discoveries 
to  be  compared  with  those  of  Boyle  and  Pascal,  and 
Bacon  and  Newton,  or  of  Locke,  and  Milton,  and 
Butler. 

And  I here  may  be  allowed  to  suggest  that,  often  as 
the  character  of  Newton  has  been  the  theme  of  admi- 
ration, it  has  seemed  to  me  that  the  most  distinctive 
element  of  his  greatness  has  commonly  escaped  the 
notice  of  his  eulogists.  It  was  neither  in  mathematical 
skill  nor  in  mathematical  invention  that  he  so  far  sur- 
passed his  contemporaries ; for  in  both  these  respects, 
he  divided  the  palm  with  Huygens,  and  Kepler,  and 
Leibnitz.  It  is  in  the  wide  sweep  of  his  far-reaching 
analogy,  distinguished  alike  by  its  humility  and  its 
boldness,  that  he  has  left  the  philosophers  of  all  previ- 
ous and  all  subsequent  ages  so  immeasurably  behind 
him.  Delighted  with  his  modesty  and  reciprocating  his 
confidence,  nature  held  communion  with  him  as  with  a 
favorite  son  ; to  him  she  unveiled  her  most  recondite 
mysteries ; to  him  she  revealed  the  secret  of  her  most 
subtle  transformations,  and  then,  taking  him  by  the 
hand,  she  walked  with  him  abroad  over  the  wide  ex- 
panse of  universal  being. — Occasional  Discourses . 


WEBB,  Charles  Henry,  an  American  humor- 
ist, born  at  Rouse’s  Point,  N.  Y.,  January  24,  1834. 
In  early  youth  he  ran  away  to  sea,  and  on  his  re- 
turn went  to  Illinois.  From  i860  to  1863  he  was 
editorially  connected  with  the  New  York  Times , 
in  1863-64  the  San  Francisco  Bulletin , and  in  1864 
became  editor  of  the  Californian . He  also  wrote 
in  the  New  York  Tribune  and  other  papers  under 
the  well-known  name  of  “John  Paul.”  His  books 
are  Laffith  Lank , or  Lunacy , a travesty  of  Charles 
Reade’s  Griffith  Gaunt  (1867);  St.  TweTmo,  or  the 
Cuneiform  Cy elope dist  of  Chattanooga , a travesty 
of  Mrs.  Wilson’s  St.  Ehno  (1868);  fohn  Paul's 
Book  (1874);  The  Wickedest  Woman  in  New  York 
{1875);  Parodies,  Prose  and  Verse  ( 1876);  Sea-weed % 
and  What  We  Seed:  My  Vacation  at  Long  Branch 
and  Saratoga  (1876) ; Vagrom  Verses  (1888).  He  is 
also  the  author  of  two  plays:  Our  Friend  from 
Victoria  (1865),  and  Arrah-na-Poke,  a burlesque  of 
Dion  Boucicault’s  Arrah-na-Pogue  (1865).  He  also 
edited  The  Celebrated  f limping  Frog . 

GOING  UP  THE  HUDSON. 

One  of  the  greatest  pleasures  of  steaming  up  the 
North  River  is  that  of  leaving  the  red-walled  city  be- 
hind you.  It  enables  you  to  turn  your  back  on  it  in  a 
contemptuous  way  ; or  if  perchance  you  look  back  at 
the  retreating  houses  and  fading  streets,  it  is  only  with 
a quick  glance  of  dislike,  not  the  lingering  look  of  affec* 

(iap) 


CHARLES  HENRY  WEBB 


f*T 

tion.  There  is  a feeling  of  unspeakable  relief  when  yon 
get  beyond  the  confines  of  the  city,  opposite  the  blessed 
part  of  Manhattan  where  no  streets  are  graded  and 
where  the  grass  has  not  yet  forgotten  how  to  grow.  It 
is  the  same  feeling  of  relief  that  comes  over  one  on 
emerging  from  a crowded  room  into  the  open  air.  The 
lungs  expand  and  the  muscles  of  the  heart  have  a broader 
play. 

It  has  been  urged  against  the  river  route  that  the 
scenery  becomes  monotonous ; that  after  having  been 
once  seen  it  is  “ rather  a bore  than  otherwise.”  Monot- 
onous, indeed  ! The  man  who  made  that  remark  must 
have  got  sadly  wearied  of  his  mother’s  face  in  infancy, 
possibly  he  tired  of  hearing  the  same  step  always  around 
the  cradle,  and  considered  the  old  lady  “ rather  a bore 
than  otherwise.”  But  the  scenery  of  the  Hudson  is 
never  the  same — hourly  and  daily  it  changes.  Anthony’s 
Nose  is  every  day  growing  redder,  and  you  never  saw 
the  trees  wear  the  same  shade  of  green  two  hours  in 
succession.  It  is  true,  that  going  up  the  river  by  night 
you  do  not  see  much  of  the  scenery,  after  all— -but  then 
you  have  the  satisfaction  of  knowing  it  is  there. 

It  is  pleasant,  too,  to  see  the  moon  rise  on  the  water ; 
to  watch  her  fair  face  when  she  peers  over  the  hill- 
tops, blushing  at  first,  as  though  aware  that  profane 
eyes  are  gazing  on  her  unveiled  beauties ; and  then 
gliding  with  quiet  grace  to  her  canopied  throne,  the 
zenith.  The  face  of  Miss  Moon  was  freckled  the  last 
night  I went  up  the  river.  I suspect  that  she  had  been 
kissing  the  sun  behind  the  curtains  down  yonder,  and 
this  supposition  would  also  account  for  her  late  rising. 
Although  not  given  to  making  overtures  to  strangers,  I 
could  not  forbear  remarking  to  a rather  gruff-looking 
gentleman— the  pilot,  I think — that  the  moonlight  was 
beautiful.  . . . 

It  had  been  a beautiful  day  and  was  then  a beautiful 
night.  And  between  the  beauties  of  a June  day,  and 
the  witcheries  of  a June  night,  it  is  hard  to  choose. 
While  the  one  woos  you  with  blonde  loveliness,  the 
other  comes  with  brunette  beauty,  dark-eyed  and  dark- 
tressed,  her  tresses  woven  with  diamonds  and  her  brow 
bound  by  a tiara  of  stars.  If  it  is  pleasant  to  see  Day 


122 


CHARLES  HENRY  WEBB 


look  through  the  windows  of  the  East,  and  then  come 
tripping  over  the  meadows  ; it  is  grand  to  see  Night 
come  down  in  her  simple  majesty,  muffling  the  hill-tops 
beneath  her  hood,  and  spreading  her  robes  of  velvet 
over  the  conscious  evergreens.  On  the  whole,  I give 
my  heart  and  hand  to  the  brunette  beauty. 

By  the  way,  there  is  one  feature  of  the  river  that  I 
nearly  forgot  to  mention  ; it  is  quite  as  prominent 
a feature  as  Anthony’s  Nose,  yet  you  look  for  it  in 
“ Hand-Books  of  the  Hudson,’*  in  vain.  The  inventors 
of  various  hair-lotions,  liniments,  aperients,  and  other 
abominations,  have  turned  the  rocks  along  the  river-side 
into  a medium  for  advertising  their  wares.  The  High- 
lands declare  the  glory  of  some  wretched  cough-syrup, 
the  Palisades  are  vocal  with  the  praises  of  pills,  and 
unless  some  happy  deluge  washes  off  the  inscriptions 
they  will  remain  to  puzzle  the  geologists  and  archaeolo- 
gists of  a remote  generation.  There  is  no  saying  when 
this  style  of  advertising  was  initiated.  It  is  not  im- 
probable that  it  has  existed  from  a very  early  day,  and 
that  the  inscriptions  on  the  pyramids,  which  have  occa- 
sioned so  many  conjectures,  are  simply  the  handiwork 
of  an  Egyptian  Barnum,  setting  forth  the  attractions  of 
some  fossil  “ fat  boy,”  or  calling  on  everyone  to  come 
and  see  a nondescript  from  the  interior  of  Mesopotamia. 
Our  brick  walls  will  perhaps  puzzle  posterity  in  this 
way  quite  as  much  as  the  pyramidical  piles  of  Cheops 
and  his  people  have  puzzled  us. — John  Haul's  Book . 

THE  LAY  OF  DAN*L  DREW. 

It  was  a long,  lank  Jersey  man, 

And  he  stoppeth  one  or  two : 
u I ain’t  acquaint  in  these  here  parts : 

I’m  a-lookin’  for  Dan’l  Drew. 

M I’m  a lab’rer  in  the  Vinnard ; 

My  callin’  I pursue 
At  the  Institoot  at  Madison, 

That  was  built  by  Dan’l  Drew. 

u I’m  a lab'rer  in  the  Vinnard  ; 

My  worldly  wants  are  few ; 


CHARLES  HENRY  WEBB 


123 


But  I want  some  pints  on  these  here  sheers — 
I’rn  a-lookin*  for  Dan’i  Drew." 

Again  I saw  that  laborer. 

Corner  of  Wall  and  New  ; 

He  was  looking  for  a ferry-boat. 

And  not  for  Dan’i  Drew. 

Upon  his  back  he  bore  a sack 
Of  stuff  that  men  eschew  ; 

Some  yet  moist  scrip  was  in  his  grip, 

A little  “ Waybosh,”  too. 

He  plain  was  long  of  old  R.  I., 

And  short  of  some  things  “ new." 

There  was  never  another  laborer 
Got  just  such  “ pints  ” from  Drew. 

At  the  ferry-gate  I saw  him  late, 

His  white  cravat  askew, 

A-paying  his  fare  with  a registered  share 
Of  stock  “ preferred  by  Drew. 

And  these  words  came  back  from  the  Hackensack: 
“ If  you  want  to  gamble  a few, 

Just  get  in  your  paw  at  a game  of  ‘draw,* 

But  don’t  take  a hand  at  Drew  ! ” 


WEBSTER,  Daniel,  an  American  statesman 
and  orator,  born  at  Salisbury,  N.  H.,  January 
18,  1782;  died  at  Marshfield,  Mass.,  October  24, 
1852.  He  was  graduated  at  Dartmouth  in  1801; 
commenced  the  study  of  law,  was  admitted  to  the 
bar  in  1805,  and  the  next  year  entered  upon  prac- 
tice at  Portsmouth,  N.  H.  In  1812  he  was  elected 
to  Congress  from  New  Hampshire,  and  was  re- 
elected in  1814.  In  1816  he  removed  to  Boston, 
and  soon  acquired  an  extensive  legal  practice. 
In  1822  he  was  elected  to  Congress  from  Boston, 
and  in  1827  was  chosen  to  the  United  States  Sen- 
ate, and  held  that  position  until  1841,  when  he 
became  Secretary  of  State  in  the  administration 
of  Mr.  W.  H.  Harrison,  retaining  that  place  during 
a portion  of  the  administration  of  Mr.  Tyler,  who 
became  President  upon  the  death  of  Mr.  Harri- 
son. In  1850  he  again  became  Secretary  of  State 
in  the  administration  of  Mr.  Fillmore.  His  health 
beginning  visibly  to  decline,  he  tendered  his  resig- 
nation of  the  secretaryship,  which  was  declined 
by  the  President.  The  closing  months  of  his  life 
were  passed  at  his  residence  of  Marshfield,  a few 
miles  from  Boston.  The  Works  of  Daniel  Web- 
ster consist  of  Orations , Discourses , and  Addresses 
on  various  occasions;  Legal  Arguments , Speeches 
and  Debates  in  Congress,  and  Diplomatic  Papers . 
Two  volumes  of  his  Private  Correspondence , edited 

(124) 


DANIEL  WEBSTER 


12$ 

by  his  son,  were  published  in  1858.  His  Life  has 
been  written  by  several  persons,  notably  by  George 
Ticknor  Curtis  (1869).  Many  personal  details  are 
given  in  Daniel  Webster  and  His  Contemporaries , by 
C.  W.  March  (1850). 

In  1830  Webster  made  what  the  popular  heart, 
if  not  the  orator’s  own  mind,  has  always  con- 
sidered his  greatest  effort — the  reply  to  Hayne. 
Its  delivery  was  a memorable  scene  in  the  an- 
nals of  Congress.  The  old  Senate-chamber  was 
crowded  to  overflowing  with  notables  of  every 
grade,  party,  and  nationality,  kept  spellbound  for 
hours  by  the  speaker’s  eloquence.  This  speech 
was  regarded,  at  the  time,  as  settling  forever,  as 
a matter  of  argument,  the  nullification  doctrine. 
Bitter  subsequent  experience  has  shown  that  both 
the  doctrine  of  secession  and  the  love  for  the 
Union  were  too  deeply  rooted  for  mere  forensic 
argument. 

Brilliant,  however,  as  Webster’s  Congressional 
speeches  are,  they  do  not  fully  equal  his  set  ora- 
tions. Three  of  these — the  Plymouth  Rock  dis- 
course, the  Bunker  Hill  Monument  discourse,  and 
the  Eulogy  on  Adams  and  Jefferson — are  among 
the  very  choicest  masterpieces  of  all  ages  and  all 
tongues.  Nothing  in  the  palmy  days  of  Greece 
or  Rome  or  England  or  France  has  ever  surpassed 
these  orations  in  unity  and  harmony  of  structure, 
or  in  simple  but  majestic  diction.  The  genius  of 
Webster  here  reveals  itself,  unfettered  by  the 
needs  of  party  and  untainted  by  the  heat  of  de- 
bate, in  all  its  depth,  its  sweetness,  and  its  origi- 
nality. We  cannot  analyze  these  orations-  Each 


126 


DANIEL  WEBSTER 


seems  to  pour  itself  forth  as  the  single,  spontane- 
ous utterance  of  a great,  creative  mind.  It  is  the 
voice  of  a man  who  has  something  grand  to  say 
to  his  fellow-men.  To  the  student,  these  ora* 
tions,  and  indeed  all  of  Webster’s  speeches,  may  be 
recommended  as  models  of  style  to  be  carefully 
considered. 

It  is  especially  true  of  Webster  that  the  style  is 
the  man.  His  style  is  the  plain,  straightforward 
expression  of  a clear  and  earnest  mind.  The  sen- 
tences are  singularly  free  from  the  tricks  of  rhet- 
oric in  which  most  orators  delight  to  deal,  and 
the  words  are  the  living  embodiment  of  the  ideas 
which  they  are  intended  to  convey,  while  back  of 
all  we  seem  to  see  the  tall  gravely  impassioned 
form  of  the  orator  himself,  arousing  us,  convinc- 
ing us,  swaying  us  at  his  will. 

“ Webster  has  not  shaped  the  political  destinies 
of  his  country  as  directly  or  as  permanently,  per- 
haps, as  Jefferson  and  Hamilton  have  done,”  says 
Professor  Hart ; “ but  he  had  a wider  range  of 
intellect  and  culture  than  either,  and  he  is,  on  the 
whole,  the  most  attractive  figure  in  the  American 
political  arena  next  to  Washington.  With  all  his 
mistakes  and  shortcomings  he  was  a man  to  be 
loved  and  respected.  The  nickname  of  ‘ Black 
Dan*  only  indicates  the  familiar  affection  with 
which  he  was  regarded  by  his  followers.  He 
stood  alone  in  his  generation — a tall,  commanding 
figure,  with  swarthy  complexion,  sonorous  voice, 
deep-seated,  lustrous  eye,  overhanging  brows, 
and  a grand,  majestic  head  whose  size  has  be* 
come  proverbial" 


DANIEL  WEBSTER 


127 


In  private  life  Mr.  Webster  was  genial  and  en- 
tertaining, and  he  lived  and  died  an  enthusiastic 
sportsman  and  disciple  of  Izaak  Walton.  Amid 
all  his  greatness  he  was  never  so  happy  as  when 
rambling,  gun  in  hand,  over  the  shooting-grounds 
at  Marshfield  or  patting  the  necks  of  his  favorite 
cattle. 

FIRST  SETTLEMENT  OF  NEW  ENGLAND. 

Let  us  rejoice  that  we  behold  this  day.  Let  us  be 
thankful  that  we  have  lived  to  see  the  bright  and  happy 
breaking  of  the  auspicious  morn  which  commences  the 
third  century  of  the  history  of  New  England.  Auspi- 
cious indeed — bringing  a happiness  beyond  the  common 
allotment  of  Providence  to  men— full  of  present  joy, 
and  gilding  with  bright  beams  the  prospect  of  futurity, 
is  the  dawn  that  awakens  us  to  the  commemoration  of 
the  Landing  of  the  Pilgrims.  . . . 

We  have  come  to  this  Rock  to  record  here  our  homage 
for  our  Pilgrim  Fathers  ; our  sympathy  in  their  suffer- 
ings ; our  gratitude  for  their  labors  ; our  admiration  for 
their  virtues  ; our  veneration  for  their  piety  ; and  our 
attachment  to  those  principles  of  civil  and  religious  lib- 
erty which  they  encountered,  the  dangers  of  the  ocean, 
the  storms  of  heaven,  the  violence  of  savages,  disease, 
exile,  and  famine,  to  enjoy  and  to  establish.  And  we 
would  leave  here,  also,  for  the  generations  that  are  ris- 
ing up  rapidly  to  fill  our  places,  some  proof  that  we  have 
endeavored  to  transmit  the  great  inheritance  unim- 
paired ; that  in  our  estimate  of  public  principles  and 
private  virtue,  in  our  veneration  of  religion  and  piety,  in 
our  devotion  to  civil  and  religious  liberty,  in  our  regard 
for  whatever  advances  human  knowledge  or  improves 
human  happiness,  we  are  not  altogether  unworthy  of 
our  origin. 

There  is  a local  feeling  connected  with  this  occasion 
too  strong  to  be  resisted — a sort  of  genius  of  the  place 
which  inspires  and  awes.  We  feel  that  we  are  on  the 
spot  where  the  first  scene  of  our  history  was  laid  ; where 
the  hearths  and  altar*  of  New  England  were  first  placed  * 


JJANiEL  WBBSTB* 


13$ 

where  Christianity,  and  civilization,  and  letters  made 
their  first  lodgement  in  a vast  extent  of  country  covered 
with  a wilderness,  and  peopled  by  roving  barbarians. 
We  are  here  at  the  season  of  the  year  at  which  the  event 
took  place.  The  imagination  irresistibly  draws  around 
us  the  principal  features  and  the  leading  characters  in 
the  original  scene.  We  cast  our  eyes  abroad  on  the 
ocean,  and  we  see  where  the  little  bark,  with  the  inter- 
esting group  on  its  deck,  made  its  slow  progress  to  the 
shore.  We  look  around  us,  and  behold  the  hills  and  prom- 
ontories where  the  anxious  eyes  of  our  fathers  first 
saw  the  places  of  habitation  and  of  rest.  We  feel  the 
cold  that  benumbed,  and  listen  to  the  winds  that  pierced 
them.  Beneath  us  is  the  Rock  on  which  New  England 
received  the  feet  of  the  Pilgrims. 

We  seem  even  to  behold  them  as  they  struggle  with 
the  elements,  and,  with  toilsome  efforts,  gain  the  shore. 
We  listen  to  the  chiefs  in  council  ; we  see  the  unexam- 
pled exhibition  of  female  fortitude  and  resignation  ; we 
hear  the  whisperings  of  youthful  impatience  ; and  we 
see— what  a painter  of  our  own  has  also  represented  by 
his  pencil — chilled  and  shivering  childhood,  houseless 
but  for  a mother’s  arms,  couchless  but  for  a mother’s 
breast,  till  our  blood  almost  freezes.  The  mild  dignity 
of  Carver  and  of  Bradford  ; the  decision  and  soldier- 
like air  and  manner  of  Standish  ; the  devout  Brewster  ; 
the  enterprising  Allerton  ; the  general  firmness  and 
thoughtfulness  of  the  whole  band  ; their  conscious  joy 
for  dangers  escaped  ; their  deep  solicitude  about  dan- 
gers to  come  ; their  trust  in  Heaven  ; their  high  relig- 
ious faith,  full  of  confidence  and  anticipation  : all  of 
.these  seem  to  belong  to  this  place,  and  to  be  present 
upon  this  occasion  to  fill  us  with  reverence  and  admira- 
tion. . . . 

The  morning  that  beamed  on  the  first  night  of  their 
repose  saw  the  Pilgrims  already  at  home  in  their  coun- 
try. There  were  political  institutions,  and  civil  liberty, 
and  religious  worship.  Poetry  has  fancied  nothing  in 
the  wanderings  of  heroes  so  distinct  and  characteristic. 
Here  was  man,  indeed,  unprotected  and  unprovided  for 
on  the  shore  of  a rude  and  fearful  wilderness ; but  it 
was  politic,  intelligent,  and  educated  man.  Everything 


DANIEL  WEBSTER 


1 2cj 


was  civilized  but  the  physical  world.  Institutions,  con- 
taining in  substance  all  that  ages  had  done  for  human 
governments,  were  organized  in  a forest.  Cultivated 
Mind  was  to  act  on  uncultivated  Nature  ; and,  more 
than  all,  a government  and  a country  were  to  com- 
mence, with  the  very  first  foundations  laid  under  the 
divine  light  of  the  Christian  religion.  Happy  aus- 
pices of  a happy  futurity ! Who  would  wish  that  his 
country’s  existence  had  otherwise  begun  ? Who  would 
desire  the  power  of  going  back  to  the  age  of  fable  ? 
Who  would  wish  for  an  origin  obscured  in  the  darkness 
of  antiquity  ? Who  would  wish  for  other  emblazoning 
of  his  country’s  heraldry,  or  other  ornaments  of  her 
genealogy,  than  to  be  able  to  say  that  her  first  exist- 
ence was  with  intelligence,  her  first  breath  the  inspira- 
tion of  liberty,  her  first  principle  the  truth  of  divine 
religion  ? . . . 

We  would  leave  for  the  consideration  of  those  who 
shall  occupy  our  places  some  proof  that  we  hold  the 
blessings  transmitted  from  our  fathers  in  just  estima- 
tion ; some  proof  of  our  attachment  to  the  cause  of 
good  government,  and  that  of  civil  and  religious  lib- 
erty ; some  proof  of  a sincere  and  ardent  desire  to  pro- 
mote everything  which  may  enlarge  the  understandings 
and  improve  the  hearts  of  men.  And  when  from  the 
long  distance  of  a hundred  years  they  shall  look  back 
upon  us,  they  shall  know  at  least  that  we  are  possessed 
of  affections  which,  running  backward  and  warming 
with  gratitude  for  what  our  ancestors  have  done  for 
our  happiness,  run  forward  also  to  our  posterity,  and 
meet  them  with  cordial  salutation,  ere  yet  they  have 
arrived  on  the  shore  of  being. 

Advance,  then,  ye  future  generations  ! We  would 
hail  you  as  you  rise,  in  your  long  succession,  to  fill  the 
places  which  we  now  fill,  and  to  taste  the  blessings  of 
existence  where  we  are  passing,  and  soon  shall  have 
passed,  our  own  human  duration.  We  bid  you  welcome 
to  this  pleasant  land  of  the  Fathers.  We  bid  you  wel- 
come to  the  healthful  skies  and  verdant  fields  of  New 
England.  We  greet  your  accession  to  the  great  inherit- 
ance which  we  have  enjoyed.  We  welcome  you  to  the 
blessings  of  good  government  and  religious  liberty. 


130 


DANIEL  WEBSTER 


We  welcome  you  to  the  treasures  of  science  and  the  de» 
lights  of  learning.  We  welcome  you  to  the  transcen- 
dent sweets  of  domestic  life,  to  the  happiness  of  kindred, 
and  parents,  and  children.  We  welcome  you  to  the 
immeasurable  blessings  of  rational  existence,  and  the 
immortal  hope  of  Christianity,  and  the  light  of  ever- 
lasting truth. — Discourse  at  Plymouth , December  22 , 1820. 

REPLY  TO  MR.  HAYNE’s  STRICTURES  ON  NEW  ENGLAND. 

— THE  GAGE  ACCEPTED. 

It  was  put  as  a question  for  me  to  answer,  and  so  put 
as  if  it  were  difficult  for  me  to  answer,  whether  I deemed 
the  member  from  Missouri  an  overmatch  for  myself  in 
debate  here.  It  seems  to  me,  sir,  that  this  is  extraor- 
dinary language,  and  an  extraordinary  tone,  for  the 
discussions  of  this  body. 

Matches  and  overmatches ! Those  terms  are  more 
applicable  elsewhere  than  here,  and  fitter  for  other  as- 
semblies than  this.  Sir,  the  gentleman  seems  to  forget 
where  and  what  we  are.  This  is  a Senate,  a Senate  of 
equals,  of  men  of  individual  honor  and  personal  charac- 
ter, and  of  absolute  independence.  We  know  no  mas- 
ters, we  acknowledge  no  dictators.  This  is  a hall  for 
mutual  consultation  and  discussion  ; not  an  arena  for 
the  exhibition  of  champions.  I offer  myself,  sir,  as  a 
match  for  no  man  ; I throw  the  challenge  of  debate  at 
no  man’s  feet.  But  then,  sir,  since  the  honorable  mem- 
ber has  put  the  question  in  a manner  that  calls  for  an 
answer,  I will  give  him  an  answer ; and  I tell  him,  that, 
holding  myself  to  be  the  humblest  of  the  members  here, 
I yet  know  nothing  in  the  arm  of  his  friend  from  Mis- 
souri, either  alone  or  when  aided  by  the  arm  of  his 
friend  from  South  Carolina,  that  need  deter  even  me 
from  espousing  whatever  opinions  I may  choose  to  es- 
pouse, from  debating  whenever  I may  choose  to  debate, 
or  from  speaking  whatever  I may  see  fit  to  say,  on  the 
floor  of  the  Senate.  Sir,  when  uttered  as  matter  of 
commendation  or  compliment,  I should  dissent  from 
nothing  which  the  honorable  member  might  say  of  his 
friend.  Still  less  do  I put  forth  any  pretensions  of  my 
pwn.  But  when  put  to  me  as  a matter  of  taunt,  I throw 


DANIEL  WEBSTER 


131 

it  back,  and  say  to  the  gentleman  that  he  could  possi- 
bly say  nothing  less  likely  than  such  a comparison  to 
wound  my  pride  of  personal  character.  The  anger  of 
its  tone  rescued  the  remark  from  intentional  irony, 
which  otherwise,  probably,  would  have  been  its  general 
acceptation.  But,  sir,  if  it  be  imagined  that  by  this 
mutual  quotation  of  commendation  ; if  it  be  supposed 
that,  by  casting  the  characters  of  the  drama,  assigning 
to  each  his  part,  to  one  the  attack,  to  another  the  cry 
of  onset ; or  if  it  be  thought  that,  by  a loud  and  empty 
vaunt  of  anticipated  victory,  any  laurels  are  to  be  won 
here  ; if  it  be  imagined,  especially,  that  any,  or  all  these 
things,  will  shake  any  purpose  of  mine,  I can  tell  the 
honorable  member,  once  for  all,  that  he  is  greatly  mis- 
taken, and  that  he  is  dealing  with  one  of  whose  temper 
and  character  he  has  yet  much  to  learn.  Sir,  I shall 
not  allow  myself,  on  this  occasion,  I hope  on  no  occa- 
sion, to  be  betrayed  into  any  loss  of  temper  ; but  if 
provoked,  as  I trust  I never  shall  be,  into  crimination 
and  recrimination,  the  honorable  member  may  perhaps 
find  that,  in  that  contest,  there  will  be  blows  to  take  as 
well  as  blows  to  give  ; that  others  can  state  compari- 
sons as  significant,  at  least,  as  his  own,  and  that  his  im- 
punity may  possibly  demand  of  him  whatever  powers 
of  taunt  and  sarcasm  he  may  possess. 

I commend  him  to  a prudent  husbandry  of  his  re- 
sources. . . . — From  the  Second  Speech  on  Foot's  Reso- 

lution, United  States  Senate,  January  26,  1830. 


THE  NATIONAL  GOVERNMENT  : ITS  ORIGIN,  AND  THE 
SOURCE  OF  ITS  POWER. 

What  the  gentleman  contends  for  is  that  it  is  con- 
stitutional to  interrupt  the  administration  itself,  in  the 
hands  of  those  who  are  chosen  and  sworn  to  administer 
it,  by  the  direct  interference,  in  the  form  of  law,  of  the 
States,  in  virtue  of  their  sovereign  capacity.  The  in- 
herent right  of  the  People  to  reform  their  Government 
I do  not  deny  ; and  they  have  another  right,  and  that  is, 
to  resist  unconstitutional  laws  without  overturning  the 
Government.  It  is  no  doctrine  of  mine  that  unconstitu- 
VOL.  XXIV.-*5 


132 


DANIEL  WEBSTER 


tional  laws  bind  the  People.  The  great  question  is, 
Whose  prerogative  is  it  to  decide  on  the  constitutionality 
or  unconstitutionality  of  the  laws?  On  this  the  main 
debate  hinges.  The  proposition  that,  in  case  of  a sup- 
posed violation  of  the  Constitution  by  Congress,  the 
States  have  a constitutional  right  to  interfere  and  annul 
the  law  of  Congress,  is  the  proposition  of  the  gentle- 
man. I do  not  admit  it. 

If  the  gentleman  had  intended  no  more  than  to  as- 
sert the  right  of  revolution  for  justifiable  cause,  he 
would  have  said  only  what  all  agree  to.  But  I cannot 
conceive  that  there  can  be  a middle  course  between 
submission  to  the  laws,  when  regularly  pronounced  con- 
stitutional, on  the  one  hand,  and  open  resistance  — 
which  is  revolution  or  rebellion — on  the  other.  I say 
the  right  of  a State  to  annul  a law  of  Congress  cannot 
be  maintained  but  on  the  ground  of  the  unalienable 
right  of  man  to  resist  oppression  : that  is  to  say,  upon 
the  ground  of  revolution.  I admit  that  there  is  an  ulti- 
mate violent  remedy,  above  the  Constitution,  and  in  de- 
fiance of  the  Constitution,  which  may  be  resorted  to 
when  a revolution  is  to  be  justified.  I do  not  admit 
that,  under  the  Constitution,  and  in  conformity  with 
it,  there  is  any  mode  in  which  a State  Government,  as 
a member  of  the  Union,  can  interfere,  and  stop  the 
progress  of  the  General  Government,  by  force  of  her 
own  laws,  under  any  circumstances  whatever. 

This  leads  us  to  inquire  into  the  origin  of  this  Govern- 
ment and  the  source  of  its  power.  Whose  agent  is  it  ? 
Is  it  the  creature  of  the  State  Legislatures,  or  the  creat- 
ure of  the  People  ? If  the  Government  of  the  United 
States  be  the  agent  of  the  State  Governments,  then 
they  may  control  it — provided  they  can  agree  upon  the 
manner  of  controlling  it.  If  it  is  the  agent  of  the  Peo- 
ple, then  the  People  can  control  it,  restrain  it,  modify,  or 
reform  it.  It  is  observable  enough  that  the  doctrine  for 
which  the  honorable  gentleman  contends  leads  him  to 
the  necessity  of  maintaining  not  only  that  this  General 
Government  is  the  creature  of  the  States,  but  that  it 
is  the  creature  of  each  of  the  States  severally ; so  that 
each  may  assert  the  power  for  itself  of  determining 
wnether  it  acts  within  the  limits  of  its  authority.  It 


DANIEL  WEBSTER 


*33 

is  the  servant  of  four-and-twenty  masters,  of  different 
wills  and  different  purposes  ; and  yet  bound  to  obey  all. 

This  absurdity  (for  it  seems  no  less)  arises  from  a 
misconception  of  the  origin  of  this  Government,  and 
its  true  character.  It  is  the  People’s  Constitution,  the 
People’s  Government,  made  for  the  People,  made  by 
the  People,  and  answerable  to  the  People.  The  Peo- 
ple of  the  United  States  have  declared  that  this  Consti- 
tution shall  be  the  supreme  law.  We  must  either  admit 
this  proposition,  or  dispute  their  authority.  The  States 
are  undoubtedly  sovereign,  so  far  as  their  sovereignty 
is  not  affected  by  this  supreme  law.  The  State  Legis- 
latures, as  political  bodies — however  sovereign — are  yet 
not  sovereign  over  the  People.  So  far  as  the  People 
have  given  power  to  the  General  Government,  so  far 
the  grant  is  unquestionably  good  ; and  the  Government 
holds  of  the  People,  and  not  of  the  State  Governments. 
We  are  all  agents  of  the  same  supreme  power — the  Peo- 
ple. The  General  Government  and  the  State  Govern- 
ments derive  their  authority  from  the  same  source. 
Neither  can,  in  relation  to  the  other,  be  called  primary; 
though  one  is  definite  and  restricted,  and  the  other 
general  and  residuary. 

The  National  Government  possesses  those  powers 
which  it  can  be  shown  the  People  have  conferred  upon 
it — and  no  more.  All  the  rest  belong  to  the  State 
Governments,  or  to  the  People  themselves.  So  far  as 
the  People  have  restrained  State  sovereignty  by  the  ex- 
pression of  their  will  in  the  Constitution  of  the  United 
States,  so  far,  it  must  be  admitted,  State  sovereignty  is 
effectively  controlled.  I do  not  contend  that  it  is,  or 
ought  to  be,  controlled  further.  The  sentiment  to  which 
I have  referred  propounds  that  State  sovereignty  is  only 
to  be  controlled  by  its  own  “ feeling  of  justice.”  That 
is  to  say,  it  is  not  to  be  controlled  at  all  ; for  one  who 
is  to  follow  his  feelings  is  under  no  legal  control. 

Now — however  we  may  think  this  ought  to  be — the 
fact  is  that  the  People  of  the  United  States  have  chosen 
to  impose  control  on  State  sovereignties.  The  Consti- 
tution has  ordered  the  matter  differently,  from  what  this 
opinion  announces.  To  make  war,  for  instance,  is  an 
exercise  of  sovereignty ; but  the  Constitution  declares 


*34 


DANIEL  WEBSTER 


that  no  State  shall  make  war.  To  coin  money  is  an- 
other exercise  of  sovereign  power  ; but  no  State  is  at 
liberty  to  coin  money.  Again  : the  Constitution  says 
that  no  State  shall  be  so  sovereign  as  to  make  a treaty. 
These  prohibitions,  it  must  be  confessed,  are  a control 
on  the  State  sovereignty  of  South  Carolina,  as  well  as 
the  other  States,  which  does  not  arise  “ from  her  own 
feelings  of  honorable  justice.”  Such  an  opinion,  there- 
fore, is  in  defiance  of  the  plainest  provisions  of  the 
Constitution.  . . . 

The  People  have  wisely  provided,  in  the  Constitution 
itself,  a proper,  suitable  mode  and  tribunal  for  settling 
questions  of  constitutional  law.  There  are  in  the  Con- 
stitution grants  of  powers  to  Congress,  and  restrictions 
on  those  powers.  There  are  also  prohibitions  on  the 
States.  Some  authority  must  therefore  necessarily  ex- 
ist, having  the  ultimate  jurisdiction  to  fix  and  ascertain 
the  interpretation  of  these  grants,  restrictions,  and  pro- 
hibitions. The  Constitution  itself  has  pointed  out,  or- 
dained, and  established  that  authority.  How  has  it 
accomplished  this  great  and  essential  end  ? By  declar- 
ing that  “ The  Constitution,  and  the  laws  of  the  United 
States  made  in  pursuance  thereof,  shall  be  the  supreme 
law  of  the  land,  anything  in  the  Constitution  or  laws  of 
any  State  to  the  contrary  notwithstanding.” 

This  was  the  first  great  step.  By  this  the  supremacy 
of  the  Constitution  and  laws  of  the  United  States  is 
declared.  The  People  so  will  it.  No  State  law  is  to 
be  valid  which  comes  in  conflict  with  the  Constitution 
or  any  law  of  the  United  States.  But  who  shall  decide 
this  question  of  interference  ? To  whom  lies  the  last 
appeal  ? This  the  Constitution  itself  decides  also,  by 
declaring  that  “ The  judicial  power  shall  extend  to  all 
questions  arising  under  the  Constitution  and  laws  of 
the  United  States.” 

These  two  provisions  cover  the  whole  ground.  They 
are,  in  truth,  the  key-stone  of  the  arch.  With  these  it 
is  a Constitution  ; without  them  it  is  a Confederacy. 
In  pursuance  of  these  clear  and  express  provisions, 
Congress  established  at  its  very  first  session,  in  the  Ju- 
dicial Act,  a mode  for  carrying  them  into  full  effect,  and 
for  bringing  all  questions  of  constitutional  power  to  the 


DANIEL  WEBSTER 


135 


final  decision  of  the  Supreme  Court.  It  then  became  a 
Government.  It  then  had  the  means  of  self-protection  ; 
and  but  for  this,  it  would,  in  all  probability,  have  been 
now  among  the  things  which  are  now  past.  Having 
constituted  the  Government,  and  declared  its  powers, 
the  People  have  further  said  that,  since  somebody  must 
decide  on  the  extent  of  these  powers,  the  Government 
itself  must  decide — subject  always — like  other  popular 
governments — to  its  responsibility  to  the  People. 

And  now,  I repeat,  how  is  it  that  a State  Legislature 
acquires  any  right  to  interfere  ! Who,  or  what,  gives 
them  the  right  to  say  to  the  People,  “ We,  who  are  your 
agents  and  servants  for  one  purpose,  will  undertake  to 
decide  that  your  other  agents  and  servants,  appointed 
by  you  for  another  purpose,  have  transcended  the  au- 
thority you  gave  them  ? ” The  reply  would  be,  I think, 
not  impertinent,  “ Who  made  you  a judge  over  another’s 
servants?  To  their  own  masters  they  stand  or  fall.”  I 
deny  this  power  of  State  Legislatures  altogether.  It 
cannot  stand  the  test  of  examination. 

Gentlemen  may  say  that,  in  an  extreme  case,  a State 
Government  might  protect  the  people  from  intolerable 
oppression.  In  such  a case  People  might  protect  them- 
selves without  the  aid  of  the  State  Governments.  Such 
a case  warrants  revolution.  It  must  make — when  it 
comes — a law  for  itself.  A Nullifying  Act  of  a State 
Legislature  cannot  alter  the  case,  nor  make  resistance 
any  more  lawful.  In  maintaining  these  sentiments,  I 
am  but  asserting  the  rights  of  the  People.  I state  what 
they  have  declared,  and  insist  on  their  right  to  declare 
it.  They  have  chosen  to  repose  this  power  in  the  Gen- 
eral Government ; and  I think  it  my  duty  to  support  it, 
like  other  constitutional  powers. — From  a Speech  in  the 
United  States  Senate , January  27,  iSjo,  in  reply  to  Mr • 
Hayne . 


IMAGINARY  SPEECH  OF  JOHN  ADAMS. 

It  was  for  Mr.  Adams  to  reply  to  arguments  like 
.hese.  We  know  his  opinions,  and  we  know  his  charac- 
ter. He  would  commence,  with  his  accustomed  direct- 
ness and  earnestness : 


DANIEL  WEBSTER 


136 

“ Sink  or  swim,  live  or  die,  survive  or  perish,  I give 
ray  hand  and  my  heart  to  this  vote.  It  is  true,  indeed, 
that  in  the  beginning  we  aimed  not  at  independence. 
But  there’s  a Divinity  which  shapes  our  ends.  The 
injustice  of  England  has  driven  us  to  arms  ; and, 
blinded  to  her  own  interest  for  our  good,  she  has  obsti- 
nately persisted  till  independence  is  now  within  our 
grasp.  We  have  but  to  reach  forth  to  it,  and  it  is  ours. 
Why,  then,  should  we  defer  the  Declaration  ? Is  any 
man  so  weak  as  now  to  hope  for  a reconciliation  with 
England  which  shall  leave  either  safety  to  the  country 
and  its  liberties,  or  safety  to  his  own  life  and  his  own 
honor  ? Are  not  you,  sir,  who  sit  in  that  chair  ; is  not 
he,  our  venerable  colleague,  near  you  ; are  you  not  both 
already  the  proscribed  objects  of  punishment  and  of 
vengeance  ? Cut  off  from  all  hope  of  royal  clemency, 
what  are  you,  what  can  you  be,  while  the  power  of 
England  remains,  but  outlaws?  If  we  postpone  inde- 
pendence, do  we  mean  to  carry  on,  or  to  give  up,  the 
war?  Do  we  mean  to  submit  to  the  measures  of  Parlia- 
ment, Boston  Port  bill,  and  all  ? Do  we  mean  to  sub- 
mit, and  consent  that  we  ourselves  shall  be  ground  to 
powder,  and  our  country  and  its  rights  trodden  down 
in  the  dust?  I know  we  do  not  mean  to  submit.  We 
never  shall  submit.  Do  we  intend  to  violate  that  most 
solemn  obligation  ever  entered  into  by  men,  that  plight- 
ing, before  God,  of  our  sacred  honor  to  Washington, 
when,  putting  him  forth  to  incur  the  dangers  of  war,  as 
well  as  the  political  hazards  of  the  times,  w7e  promised  to 
adhere  to  him,  in  every  extremity,  with  our  fortunes  and 
our  lives?  I know  there  is  not  a man  here  who  would 
not  rather  see  a general  conflagration  sweep  over  the 
land,  or  an  earthquake  sink  it,  than  one  jot  or  tittle  of 
that  plighted  faith  fall  to  the  ground.  For  myself,  hav- 
ing, twelve  months  ago,  in  this  place,  moved  you  that 
George  Washington  be  appointed  commander  of  the 
forces  raised,  or  to  be  raised,  for  defence  of  American 
liberty,  may  my  right  hand  forget  her  cunning,  and  my 
tongue  cleave  to  the  roof  of  my  mouth,  if  I hesitate  or 
waver  in  the  support  I give  him. 

“The  war,  then,  must  go  on.  We  must  fight  it 
through.  And  if  the  war  must  go  on,  why  put  off 


DANIEL  WEBSTER 


137 


longer  the  Declaration  of  Independence?  That  meas- 
ure will  strengthen  us.  It  will  give  us  character  abroad. 
The  nations  will  then  treat  with  us,  which  they  never 
can  do  while  we  acknowledge  ourselves  subjects  in  arms 
against  our  sovereign.  Nay,  I maintain  that  England 
herself  will  sooner  treat  for  peace  with  us  on  the  foot- 
ing of  independence  than  consent,  by  repealing  her 
acts,  to  acknowledge  that  her  whole  conduct  toward  us 
has  been  a course  of  injustice  and  oppression.  Her 
pride  will  be  less  wounded  by  submitting  to  that  course 
of  things  which  now  predestinates  our  independence 
than  by  yielding  the  points  in  controversy  to  her  re- 
bellious subjects.  The  former  she  would  regard  as  the 
result  of  fortune  ; the  latter  she  would  feel  as  her  own 
deep  disgrace.  Why,  then,  why  then,  sir,  do  we  not  as 
soon  as  possible  change  this  from  a civil  to  a national 
war  ? And  since  we  must  fight  it  through,  why  not  put 
ourselves  in  a state  to  enjoy  all  the  benefits  of  victory  ? 

“ If  we  fail,  it  can  be  no  worse  for  us.  But  we  shall 
not  fail.  The  cause  will  raise  up  armies  ; the  cause  will 
create  navies.  The  people,  the  people,  if  we  are  true  to 
them,  will  carry  us,  and  will  carry  themselves,  gloriously, 
through  this  struggle.  I care  not  how  fickle  other 
people  have  been  found.  1 know  the  people  of  these 
Colonies,  and  I know  that  resistance  to  British  ag- 
gression is  deep  and  settled  in  their  hearts  and  cannot 
be  eradicated.  Every  Colony,  indeed,  has  expressed  its 
willingness  to  follow,  if  we  but  take  the  lead.  Sir,  the 
Declaration  will  inspire  the  people  with  increased  cour- 
age. Instead  of  a long  and  bloody  ”r=‘r  fDr  the  restora- 
tion of  privileges,  for  redress  of  grievances,  for  char- 
tered immunities,  held  under  a British  king,  set  before 
them  the  glorious  object  of  entire  independence,  and  it 
will  breathe  into  them  anew  the  breath  of  life.  Read  this 
Declaration  at  the  head  of  the  army ; every  sword  will 
be  drawn  from  its  scabbard,  and  the  solemn  vow  uttered 
to  maintain  it,  or  to  perish  on  the  bed  of  honor.  Pub- 
lish it  from  the  pulpit ; religion  will  approve  it,  and  the 
love  of  religious  liberty  will  cling  round  it,  resolved  to 
stand  with  it  or  fall  with  it.  Send  it  to  the  public  halls  ; 
proclaim  it  there  ; let  them  hear  it  who  heard  the  first 
roar  of  the  enemy’s  cannon  ; let  them  see  it  who  saw 


138 


DANIEL  WEBSTER 


their  brothers  and  their  sons  fall  on  the  field  of  Bunker 
Hill,  and  in  the  streets  of  Lexington  and  Concord,  and 
the  very  walls  will  cry  out  in  its  support. 

“ Sir,  I know  the  uncertainty  of  human  affairs,  but  I 
see,  I see  clearly,  through  this  day’s  business.  You  and 
I,  indeed,  may  rue  it.  We  may  not  live  to  the  time 
when  this  Declaration  shall  be  made  good.  We  may 
die — die  colonists  ; die  slaves  ; die,  it  may  be,  igno- 
miniously,  and  on  the  scaffold.  Be  it  so.  Be  it  so.  If 
it  be  the  pleasure  of  Heaven  that  my  country  shall  re- 
quire the  poor  offering  of  my  life,  the  victim  shall  be 
ready,  at  the  appointed  hour  of  sacrifice,  come  when 
that  hour  may.  But  while  I do  live,  let  me  have  a 
country,  or  at  least  the  hope  of  a country,  and  that  a 
free  country. 

“ But  whatever  may  be  our  fate,  be  assured,  be  as- 
sured that  this  Declaration  will  stand.  It  may  cost 
treasure,  and  it  may  cost  blood  ; but  it  will  stand,  and 
it  will  richly  compensate  for  both.  Through  the  thick 
gloom  of  the  present  I see  the  brightness  of  the  future, 
as  the  sun  in  heaven.  We  shall  make  this  a glorious, 
an  immortal  day.  When  we  are  in  our  graves,  our 
children  will  honor  it.  They  will  celebrate  it  with 
thanksgiving,  with  festivity,  with  bonfires,  and  illumi- 
nations. On  its  annual  return  they  will  shed  tears,  copi- 
ous, gushing  tears,  not  of  subjection  and  slavery,  not  of 
agony  and  distress,  but  of  exultation,  of  gratitude,  and  of 
joy.  Sir,  before  God,  I believe  the  hour  is  come.  My 
judgment  approves  this  measure,  and  my  whole  heart  is 
in  it.  All  that  I have,  and  all  that  I am,  and  all  that  I 
hope,  in  this  life,  I am  now  ready  here  to  stake  upon  it ; 
and  I leave  off  as  I begun,  that,  live  or  die,  survive  or 
perish,  I am  for  the  Declaration.  It  is  my  living  senti- 
ment, and,  by  the  blessing  of  God,  it  shall  be  my  dying 
sentiment — Independence  now,  and  independence  for- 
ever.”— From  a Discourse  on  the  Lives  and  Services  of 
Adams  and  Jefferson. 

THE  SHAFT  AT  BUNKER  HILL. 

We  know,  indeed,  that  the  record  of  illustrious  actions 
is  most  safely  deported  in  the  universal  remembrance 


DANIEL  WEBSTER 


*39 

of  mankind.  We  know  that  if  we  could  cause  this 
structure  to  ascend,  not  only  till  it  reached  the  skies, 
but,  till  it  pierced  them,  its  broad  surfaces  could  still 
contain  but  part  of  that  which,  in  an  age  of  knowledge, 
hath  already  been  spread  over  the  earth,  and  which  his- 
tory charges  itself  with  making  known  to  all  future 
times.  We  know  that  no  inscription  or  entablatures 
less  broad  than  the  earth  itself  can  carry  information  of 
the  events  we  commemorate  where  it  has  not  already 
gone  ; and  that  no  structure  which  shall  not  outlive 
the  letters  and  duration  among  men  can  prolong  the 
memorial.  But  our  object  is,  by  this  edifice,  to  show 
our  own  deep  sense  of  the  value  and  importance  of  the 
achievements  of  our  ancestors  ; and,  by  presenting  this 
work  of  gratitude  to  the  eye,  to  keep  alive  similar  sen- 
timents, and  to  foster  a constant  regard  for  the  princi- 
ples of  the  Revolution.  Human  beings  are  composed, 
not  of  reason  only,  but  of  imagination  also,  and  senti- 
ment ; and  that  is  neither  wasted  nor  misapplied  which 
is  appropriated  to  the  purpose  of  giving  right  direction 
to  sentiments,  and  opening  proper  springs  of  feeling  in 
the  heart.  Let  it  not  be  supposed  that  our  object  is  to 
perpetuate  national  hostility,  or  even  to  cherish  a mere 
military  spirit.  It  is  higher,  purer,  nobler.  We  conse- 
crate our  work  to  the  spirit  of  national  independence, 
and  we  wish  that  the  light  of  peace  may  rest  upon  it 
forever.  We  rear  a memorial  of  our  conviction  of  that 
unmeasured  benefit  which  has  been  conferred  on  our 
own  land,  and  of  the  happy  influences  which  have  been 
produced,  by  the  same  events,  on  the  general  interests 
of  mankind.  We  come,  as  Americans,  to  mark  a spot 
which  must  forever  be  dear  to  us  and  our  posterity.  We 
wish  that  whosoever,  in  all  coming  time,  shall  turn  his 
eye  hither,  may  behold  that  the  place  is  not  undistin- 
guished where  the  first  great  battle  of  the  Revolution 
was  fought.  We  wish  that  this  structure  may  proclaim 
the  magnitude  and  importance  of  that  event  to  every 
class  and  every  age.  We  wish  that  infancy  may  learn 
the  purpose  of  its  erection  from  maternal  lips,  and  that 
weary  and  withered  age  may  behold  it,  and  be  solaced 
by  the  recollections  which  it  suggests.  We  wish  that 
labor  may  look  up  here,  and  be  proud,  in  the  midst  of 


140 


DANIEL  WEBSTER 


its  toil.  We  wish  that,  in  those  days  of  disaster  which, 
as  they  come  upon  all  nations,  must  be  expected  to  come 
upon  us  also,  desponding  patriotism  may  turn  its  eyes 
hitherward,  and  be  assured  that  the  foundations  of  our 
national  powers  are  still  strong.  We  wish  that  this 
column,  rising  toward  heaven  among  the  pointed  spires 
of  so  many  temples  dedicated  to  God,  may  contribute 
also  to  produce,  in  all  minds,  a pious  feeling  of  depen- 
dence and  gratitude.  We  wish,  finally,  that  the  last  ob- 
ject to  the  sight  of  him  who  leaves  his  native  shore, 
and  the  first  to  gladden  his  who  revisits  it,  may  be  some- 
thing which  shall  remind  him  of  the  liberty  and  the 
glory  of  his  country.  Let  it  rise  ! let  it  rise,  till  it  meet 
the  sun  in  his  coming  ; let  the  earliest  light  of  the 
morning  gild  it,  and  parting  day  linger  and  play  on  its 
summit. — Address  at  the  Laying  of  the  Corner-stone  of 
Bunker  Hill  Monument , June  //,  1825. 

APOSTROPHE  TO  THE  VETERANS  OF  1775- 

Venerable  men  ! you  have  come  down  to  us  from  a 
former  generation  Heaven  has  bounteously  lengthened 
out  your  lives,  that  you  might  behold  this  joyous  day. 
You  are  now  where  you  stood  fifty  years  ago,  this 
very  hour,  with  your  brothers  and  your  neighbors, 
shoulder  to  shoulder,  in  the  strife  for  your  country. 
Behold,  how  altered  ! The  same  heavens  are  indeed 
over  your  heads  ; the  same  ocean  rolls  at  your  feet ; but 
all  else,  how  changed  ! You  hear  now  no  roar  of  hostile 
cannon,  you  see  no  mixed  volumes  of  smoke  and  flame 
rising  from  burning  Charlestown.  The  ground  strewed 
with  the  dead  and  the  dying ; the  impetuous  charge  ; 
the  steady  and  successful  repulse  ; the  loud  call  to  re- 
peated assault ; the  summoning  of  all  that  is  manly  to 
repeated  resistance  ; a thousand  bosoms  freely  and  fear- 
lessly bared  in  an  instant  to  whatever  of  terror  there  may 
be  in  war  and  death — all  these  you  have  witnessed, 
but  you  witness  them  no  more.  All  is  peace.  The 
heights  of  yonder  metropolis,  its  towers  and  roofs, 
which  you  then  saw  filled  with  wives  and  children  and 
countrymen  in  distress  and  terror,  and  looking  with 
unutterable  emotions  for  the  issue  of  the  combat,  have 


DANIEL  WEBSTER 


MI 

presented  you  to  day  with  the  sight  of  its  whole  happy 
population,  come  out  to  welcome  and  greet  you  with  a 
universal  jubilee.  Yonder  proud  ships,  by  a felicity 
of  position  appropriately  lying  at  the  foot  of  this  mount, 
and  seeming  fondly  to  cling  around  it,  are  not  means  of 
annoyance  to  you,  but  your  country’s  own  means  of 
distinction  and  defence.  All  is  peace  ; and  God  has 
granted  you  the  sight  of  your  country’s  happiness 
ere  you  slumber  in  the  grave.  He  has  allowed  you  to 
behold  and  to  partake  the  reward  of  your  patriotic 
toils  ; and  he  has  allowed  us,  your  sons  and  country- 
men, to  meet  you  here,  and  in  the  name  of  the  present 
generation,  in  the  name  of  your  country,  in  the  name  of 
liberty,  to  thank  you  ! 

But,  alas  ! you  are  not  all  here  ! Time  and  the  sword 
have  thinned  your  ranks.  Prescott,  Putnam,  Stark, 
Brooks,  Read,  Pomeroy,  Bridge  ! our  eyes  seek  for  you 
in  vain  amid  this  broken  band.  You  are  gathered  to 
your  fathers,  and  live  only  to  your  country  in  her 
grateful  remembrance  and  your  own  bright  example. 
But  let  us  not  too  much  grieve  that  you  have  met  the 
common  fate  of  men.  You  lived  at  least  long  enough 
to  know  that  your  work  had  been  nobly  and  success- 
fully accomplished.  You  lived  to  see  your  country’s 
independence  established,  and  to  sheathe  your  swords 
from  war.  On  the  light  of  Liberty  you  saw  arise  the 
light  of  Peace,  like 

“ another  morn. 

Risen  on  mid-noon  ; ** 

and  the  sky  on  which  you  closed  your  eyes  was  cloud- 
less.— From  the  Bunker  Hill  Speech. 

MURDER  WILL  OUT. 

The  deed  was  executed  with  a degree  of  self-posses- 
sion and  steadiness  equal  to  the  wickedness  with  which 
it  was  planned.  The  circumstances  now  clearly  in  evi- 
dence spread  out  the  whole  scene  before  us.  Deep 
sleep  had  fallen  on  the  destined  victim,  and  on  all  be- 
neath his  roof.  A healthful  old  man,  to  whom  sleep 
was  sweet,  the  first  sound  slumbers  of  the  night  held 


142 


DANIEL  WEBSTER 


him  in  their  soft  but  strong  embrace.  The  assassin 
enters,  through  the  window  already  prepared,  into  an 
unoccupied  apartment.  With  noiseless  foot  he  paces 
the  lonely  hall,  half-lighted  by  the  moon  ; he  winds  up 
the  ascent  of  the  stairs,  and  reaches  the  door  of  the 
chamber.  Of  this,  he  moves  the  lock,  by  soft  and  con- 
tinued pressure,  till  it  turns  on  its  hinges  without  noise  ; 
and  he  enters,  and  beholds  his  victim  before  him.  The 
room  is  uncommonly  open  to  the  admission  of  light. 
The  face  of  the  innocent  sleeper  is  turned  from  the 
murderer,  and  the  beams  of  the  moon,  resting  on  the 
gray  locks  of  his  aged  temple,  show  him  where  to 
strike.  The  fatal  blow  is  given  ! and  the  victim  passes, 
without  a struggle  or  a motion,  from  the  repose  of 
sleep  to  the  repose  of  death  ! It  is  the  assassin’s  pur- 
pose to  make  sure  work  ; and  he  plies  the  dagger, 
though  it  is  obvious  that  life  has  been  destroyed  by  the 
blow  of  the  bludgeon.  He  even  raises  the  aged  arm, 
that  he  may  not  fail  in  his  aim  at  the  heart,  and  re- 
places it  again  over  the  wounds  of  the  poniard  ! To 
finish  the  picture,  he  explores  the  wrist  for  the  pulse  ! 
He  feels  for  it,  and  ascertains  that  it  beats  no  longer. 
It  is  accomplished.  The  deed  is  done.  He  retreats, 
retraces  his  steps  to  the  window,  passes  out  through  it 
as  he  came  in,  and  escapes.  He  has  done  the  murder. 
No  eye  has  seen  him,  no  ear  has  heard  him.  The  secret 
is  his  own,  and  it  is  safe  ! 

Ah ! gentlemen,  that  was  a dreadful  mistake.  Such 
a secret  can  be  safe  nowhere.  The  whole  creation  of 
God  has  neither  nook  nor  corner  where  the  guilty  can 
bestow  it,  and  say  it  is  safe.  Not  to  speak  of  that  eye 
which  pierces  through  all  disguises,  and  beholds  every- 
thing as  in  the  splendor  of  noon,  such  secrets  of  guilt 
are  never  safe  from  detection,  even  by  men.  True  it 
is,  generally  speaking,  that  “murder  will  out.”  True 
it  is  that  Providence  hath  so  ordained,  and  doth  so 
govern  things,  that  those  who  break  the  great  law  of 
Heaven  by  shedding  man's  blood  seldom  succeed  in 
avoiding  discovery.  Especially,  in  a case  exciting  so 
much  attention  as  this,  discovery  must  come,  and  will 
come,  sooner  or  later. 

A thousand  eyes  turn  at  ooce  to  explore  every  man, 


DANIEL  WEBSTER 


143 


every  thing,  every  circumstance,  connected  with  the 
time  and  place  ; a thousand  ears  catch  every  whisper  ; 
a thousand  minds  intensely  dwell  on  the  scene,  shedding 
all  their  light,  and  ready  to  kindle  the  slightest  circum- 
stance into  a blaze  of  discovery.  Meantime  the  guilty 
soul  cannot  keep  its  own  secret.  It  is  false  to  itself  ; 
or  rather  it  feels  an  irresistible  impulse  of  conscience 
to  be  true  to  itself.  It  labors  under  its  guilty  posses- 
sion, and  knows  not  what  to  do  with  it.  The  human 
heart  was  not  made  for  the  residence  of  such  an  inhab- 
itant. It  finds  itself  preyed  on  by  a torment,  which 
it  dares  not  acknowledge  to  God  or  man.  A vulture  is 
devouring  it,  and  it  can  ask  no  sympathy  or  assistance, 
either  from  heaven  or  earth. 

The  secret  which  the  murderer  possesses  soon  comes 
to  possess  him  ; and,  like  the  evil  spirits  of  which  we 
read,  it  overcomes  him,  and  leads  him  whithersoever  it 
will.  He  feels  it  beating  at  his  heart,  rising  to  his 
throat,  and  demanding  disclosure.  He  thinks  the  whole 
world  sees  it  in  his  face,  reads  it  in  his  eyes,  and  almost 
hears  its  workings  in  the  very  silence  of  his  thoughts. 
It  has  become  his  master.  It  betrays  his  discretion,  it 
breaks  down  his  courage,  it  conquers  his  prudence. 
When  suspicions  from  without  begin  to  embarrass  him, 
and  the  net  of  circumstances  to  entangle  him,  the  fatal 
secret  struggles  with  still  greater  violence  to  burst 
forth.  It  must  be  confessed,  it  will  be  confessed  ; there 
is  no  refuge  from  confession  but  suicide,  and  suicide  is 
confession. — Argument  on  the  Trial  of  F.  J.  Knapp  for 
the  Murder  of  Joseph  White. 

HAMILTON,  THE  FINANCIER. 

He  was  made  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  ; and  how  he 
fulfilled  the  duties  of  such  a place  at  such  a time  the 
whole  country  perceived  with  delight  and  the  whole 
world  saw  with  admiration.  He  smote  the  rock  of  the 
national  resources,  and  abundant  streams  of  revenue 
gushed  forth.  He  touched  the  dead  corpse  of  the  Pub- 
lic Credit,  and  it  sprang  upon  its  feet.  The  fabled 
birth  of  Minerva,  from  the  brain  of  Jove,  was  hardly 
more  sudden  or  more  perfect  than  the  financial  system 


144 


DANIEL  WEBSTER 


of  the  United  States  as  it  burst  forth  from  the  concep- 
tion of  Alexander  Hamilton. — From  a Speech  Delivered 
at  a Public  Dinner  in  New  York , March  ioy  1831. 

THE  MEMORY  OF  THE  HEART. 

If  stores  of  dry  and  learned  lore  we  gain, 

We  keep  them  in  the  memory  of  the  brain  ; 

Names,  things,  and  facts  — whate’er  we  knowledge 
call— 

There  is  the  common  ledger  for  them  all ; 

And  images  on  this  cold  surface  traced 
Make  slight  impression,  and  are  soon  effaced. 

But  we’ve  a page,  more  glowing  and  more  bright, 

On  which  our  friendship  and  our  love  to  write ; 

That  these  may  never  from  the  soul  depart, 

We  trust  them  to  the  memory  of  the  heart. 

There  is  no  dimming,  no  effacement  there  ; 

Each  new  pulsation  keeps  the  record  clear  ; 

Warm,  golden  letters  all  the  tablet  fill, 

Nor  lose  their  lustre  till  the  heart  stands  stilL 


WEBSTER,  John,  an  English  dramatist,  born, 
probably,  in  1582;  died  in  1638.  Little  is  known 
concerning  his  life.  He  wrote  in  collaboration 
with  Ford  and  Dekker  between  1601  and  1624. 
His  individual  plays  are  the  Duchess  of  Malfi ; 
Guise,  or  the  Massacre  of  France  ; The  DeviV s Law- 
Case  ; Appius  and  Virginia , and  The  White  Devil , or 
Vittoria  Corombona.  The  first  of  these  was  pro- 
duced in  1612,  the  last  in  1623.  Webster  has  been 
called  the  “ dramatist  of  terror  and  of  pity/' 
Hazlitt  calls  him  “ the  noble-minded."  His  plays 
were  first  published  collectively  by  Dyce  in  1830. 

“ Webster  possessed  very  considerable  powers," 
says  Hallam,  “ and  ought  to  be  ranked,  I think, 
the  next  below  Ford.  With  less  of  poetic  grace 
than  Shirley,  he  had  incomparably  more  vigor ; 
with  less  of  nature  and  simplicity  than  Heywood, 
he  had  a more  elevated  genius.and  a bolder  pencil. 
But  the  deep  sorrows  and  terrors  of  tragedy  were 
peculiarly  his  provinces.  Webster  is  not  without 
comic  wit,  as  well  as  power  of  imagination. ' 

“ In  his  pictures  of  wretchedness  and  despair," 
says  Dr.  Drake,  “he  has  introduced  touches  of  ex- 
pression which  curdle  the  very  blood  with  terror 
and  make  the  hair  stand  erect.  Of  this,  the  death 
of  the  Duchess  of  Malfi,  with  all  its  preparatory 
sorrows,  is  a most  distinguishing  proof.  The  fifth 
act  of  his  Vittoria  Corombona  shows  also  with 


146 


JOHN  WEBSTER 


what  occasional  skill  he  could  imbibe  the  imagi- 
nation of  Shakespeare,  particularly  where  its  feat- 
ures seem  to  breathe  a more  than  earthly  wildness.” 
“ His  terrible  and  funereal  Muse  was  Death,” 
says  Professor  Shaw  ; “ his  wild  imagination  rev- 
elled in  images  and  sentiments  which  breathe,  as 
it  were,  the  odor  of  the  charnel : his  plays  are  full 
of  pictures  recalling  with  fantastic  variety  all  as- 
sociations of  the  weakness  and  futility  of  human 
hopes  and  interests,  and  dark  questionings  of  our 
future  destinies.  His  literary  physiognomy  has 
something  of  that  dark,  bitter,  and  woful  expres- 
sion which  makes  us  thrill  in  the  portraits  of 
Dante.  In  the  majority  of  his  subjects  he  worked 
by  preference  on  themes  which  offered  a congenial 
field  for  his  portraiture  of  the  darker  passions  and 
of  the  moral  tortures  of  their  victims.  In  select- 
ing such  revolting  themes  as  abounded  in  the  black 
annals  of  mediaeval  Italy,  Webster  followed  the 
peculiar  bent  of  his  great  and  morbid  genius;  in 
the  treatment  of  these  subjects  we  find  a strange 
mixture  of  the  horrible  with  the  pathetic.  In  his 
language  there  is  an  extraordinary  union  of  com- 
plexity and  simplicity ; he  loves  to  draw  his  il- 
lustrations not  only  from  ‘ skulls,  and  graves,  and 
epitaphs/  but  also  from  the  most  attractive  and 
picturesque  objects  in  nature,  and  his  occasional 
intermingling  of  the  deepest  and  most  innocent 
emotion  and  of  the  most  exquisite  touches  of  nat- 
ural beauty  produces  the  effect  of  the  daisy  spring- 
ing up  amidst  the  festering  mould  of  a graveyard. 
Like  many  of  his  contemporaries,  he  knew  the 
Secret  of  expressing  the  highest  passion  through 


JOHN  WEBSTER 


M7 


the  most  familiar  images  ; and  the  dirges  and  fu- 
neral songs  which  he  has  frequently  introduced 
into  his  pieces  possess,  as  Charles  Lamb  eloquent- 
ly expresses  it,  that  intensity  of  feeling  which 
seems  to  resolve  itself  into  the  very  elements  they 
contemplate.” 

LAMENTATION  FOR  MARCELLO. 

Francisco  de  Medicis. — I met  even  now  with  the  most 
piteous  sight. 

Flamitieo. — Thou  meet’st  another  here,  a pitiful,  de- 
graded courier. 

Fran,  de  Med. — Your  reverend  mother 
Is  grown  a very  old  woman  in  two  hours. 

I found  them  winding  of  Marcello’s  corse  ; 

And  there  is  such  a solemn  melody, 

'Tween  doleful  songs,  tears,  and  sad  elegies — 

Such  as  old  grandams  watching  by  the  dead 

Were  wont  to  outwear  the  nights  with — that,  believe  me, 

I had  no  eyes  to  guide  me  forth  the  room, 

They  were  so  o’ercharged  with  water. 

Flam. — I will  see  them. 

Fran,  de  Med. — ’Twere  much  uncharity  in  you  ; for 
your  sight 

Will  add  unto  their  tears. 

Flam. — I will  see  them, 

They  are  behind  the  traverse  ; I’ll  discover 

Their  superstitious  howling.  \D raws  the  curtain. 

Cornelia,  Zanche,  and  three  other  Ladies  discovered 
winding  Marcello’s  corse. 

Cornelia. — This  rosemary  is  withered  ; pray  get  fresh. 
I would  have  these  herbs  grow  up  in  his  grave, 

When  I am  dead  and  rotten.  Reach  the  bays, 

I’ll  tie  a garland  here  about  his  head  ; 

’Twill  keep  my  boy  from  lightning.  This  sheet 
I have  kept  this  twenty  year,  and  every  day 
Haliowed  it  with  my  prayers  : I did  not  think 
He  should  have  wore  it. 

Vol.  XXIV.—  i© 


JOHN  WEBSTER 


148 

Zanche. — Look  you  who  are  yonder. 

Cor . — Oh,  reach  me  the  flowers. 

Zanche. — Her  ladyship’s  foolish. 

Lady . — Alas,  her  grief 
Hath  turned  her  child  again  ! 

Cor . — You’re  very  welcome  ; 

There’s  rosemary  for  you,  and  rue  for  you  ; 

{To  Flaminio. 

Heart’s-ease  for  you  ; I pray  make  much  of  it : 

I have  left  more  for  myself. 

Fran . de  Med. — Lady,  who's  this  ? 

Cor. — You  are,  I take  it,  the  grave-maker. 

Flam. — So. 

Zanche. — ’Tis  Flamineo. 

Cor. — Will  you  make  me  such  a fool  ? Here's  a whiw 
hand ; 

Can  blood  so  soon  be  washed  out  ? Let  me  see ; 

When  screech-owls  croak  upon  the  chimney-tops, 

And  the  strange  cricket  i’  the  oven  sings  and  hops, 
When  yellow  spots  upon  your  hands  appear, 

Be  certain  then  you  of  a corse  shall  hear. 

Out  upon 't,  how  'tis  speckled ! ’t  has  handled  a tone 
sure, 

Cowslip-water  is  good  for  the  memory  : 

Pray,  buy  me  three  ounces  of 't. 

Flam. — I would  I were  from  hence. 

Cor.— Do  you  hear,  sir  ? 

I'll  give  you  a saying  which  my  grandmother 
Was  wont,  when  she  heard  the  bell  toll,  to  sing  o'er 
Unto  her  lute. 

Flam. — Do,  an  you  will,  do. 

Cor.—“  Call  for  the  robin  redbreast  and  the  wren, 
Since  o’er  shady  groves  they  hover, 

And  with  leaves  and  flowers  do  cover 
The  friendless  bodies  of  unburied  men. 

Call  unto  his  funeral  dole 

The  ant,  the  field-mouse,  and  the  mole, 

To  rear  him  hillocks  that  shall  keep  him  warm, 

And  (when  gay  tombs  are  robbed)  sustain  no  harm : 
But  keep  the  wolf  far  thence,  that’s  foe  to  men, 

For  with  his  nails  he’ll  dig  them  up  again." 

They  would  not  bury  him  ’cause  he  died  in  a quarrel; 


JOHN  WEBSTER 


149 


But  I have  an  answer  for  them  : 

“ Let  holy  Church  receive  him  duly. 

Since  he  paid  the  Church  tithes  truly/’ 

His  wealth  is  summed,  and  this  is  all  his  store, 

This  poor  men  get,  and  great  men  get  no  more. 

Now  the  wares  are  gone,  we  may  shut  up  shop. 

Bless  you  all,  good  people. 

[ Exeunt  Cornelia,  Zanche,  and  Ladies. 
Flam. — I have  a strange  thing  in  me,  to  the  which 
I cannot  give  a name,  without  it  be 
Compassion.  I pray,  leave  me. 

— The  White  Devil. 


INTEGRITY. 

These  wretched  eminent  things 
Leave  no  more  fame  behind  ’em  than  should  one 
Fall  in  a frost,  and  leave  his  print  in  snow  ; 

As  soon  as  the  sun  shines,  it  ever  melts 
Both  form  and  matter.  I have  ever  thought 
Nature  doth  nothing  so  great  for  great  men 
As  when  she’s  pleased  to  make  them  lords  of  truth : 
Integrity  of  life  is  fame’s  best  friend, 

Which  nobly,  beyond  death,  shall  crown  the  end. 

— The  Duchess  of  MalJL 


WEBSTER,  Noah,  an  American  lexicographer 
and  philologist,  born  at  West  Hartford,  Conn., 
October  1 6,  1758 ; died  at  New  Haven,  May  28, 
1843.  He  was  graduated  at  Yale  in  1778 ; taught  a 
school  at  Hartford,  at  the  same  time  studying  law, 
and  was  admitted  to  the  bar  in  1781.  He  did  not, 
however,  enter  upon  practice,  but  became  prin- 
cipal of  an  academy  at  Goshen,  N.  Y.,  where  he 
prepared  his  Spelling-Book , which  appeared  in  1783, 
and  was  followed  by  a Grammar  (1785)  and  a Read- 
ing-Book (1 787).  In  1789  he  took  up  his  residence 
in  Stratford,  Conn.,  where  he  practised  law  until 
1793.  He  then  removed  to  New  York,  where  he 
established  the  Minerva , a daily  newspaper  de- 
voted to  the  support  of  Washington’s  administra- 
tion. In  1798  he  removed  to  New  Haven,  where, 
in  1806,  he  published  a compendious  Dictionary 
of  the  English  Language  and  set  about  the  prepa- 
ration of  his  great  American  Dictionary  of  the 
English  Language . This  work  occupied  him  fully 
twenty  years,  during  half  of  which  he  resided  at 
Amherst,  Mass.,  his  income  being  wholly  derived 
from  the  sale  of  his  Spelling-Book , of  which  numer- 
ous editions  were  published.  The  dictionary  was 
published  in  England  in  1828,  in  two  octavo  vol- 
umes. Among  his  other  notable  works  are  a de- 
fensive History  of  the  Hartford  Convention  and  a 
Collection  of  Papers  on  Political,  Literary , and  Moral 
Subjects  (1843). 


NOAH  WEBSTER 


151 

THE  DIVINE  ORIGIN  OF  HUMAN  LANGUAGE. 

If  we  admit — what  is  the  literal  and  bvious  interpre- 
tation of  the  Scriptural  narrative — that  ical  sounds  or 
words  were  used  in  the  communication,  between  God 
and  the  progenitors  of  the  human  race,  1 results  that 
Adam  was  not  only  endowed  with  intelleu  for  under- 
standing his  Maker,  or  the  signification  01  words,  but  t 
was  furnished  both  with  the  faculty  of  speech  and  with 
speech  itself,  or  the  knowledge  and  use  of  words  as  signs 
of  ideas,  and  this  before  the  formation  of  the  woman. 
Hence  we  may  infer  that  language  was  conferred  upon 
Adam,  in  the  same  manner  as  all  his  other  faculties  and 
knowledge,  by  supernatural  power ; or,  in  other  words, 
was  of  divine  origin.  For  supposing  Adam  to  have  had 
all  the  intellectual  powers  of  any  adult  individual  of  the 
species  who  has  ever  lived,  we  cannot  admit  as  probable, 
or  even  possible,  that  he  should  have  invented  even  a 
barren  language,  as  soon  as  he  was  created,  without 
supernatural  aid. 

It  may  indeed  be  doubted  whether  without  such  aid 
men  would  ever  have  learned  the  use  of  the  organs  of 
speech  so  far  as  to  form  a language.  At  any  rate  the 
invention  of  words  and  the  construction  of  a language 
must  have  been  a slow  process,  and  must  have  required 
a much  longer  time  than  that  which  passed  between  the 
creation  of  Adam  and  of  Eve.  It  is  therefore  probable 
that  language,  as  well  as  the  faculty  of  speech,  was  the 
immediate  gift  of  God.  We  are  not,  however,  to  sup- 
pose the  language  of  our  first  parents  in  paradise  to  have 
been  copious,  like  most  modern  languages  ; or  the  iden- 
tical language  they  used  to  be  now  in  existence.  Many 
of  the  primitive  radical  words  may,  and  probably  do, 
exist  in  various  languages ; but  observation  teaches 
that  languages  must  improve  and  undergo  great  changes 
as  knowledge  increases,  and  be  subject  to  continual  al- 
terations from  other  causes  incident  to  men  in  society. 
— Preface  to  Dictionary. 

woman’s  education  in  the  last  century. 

In  all  the  nations  a good  education  is  that  which  ren- 
ders the  ladies  correct  in  their  manners,  respectable  in 


*52 


NOAH  WEBSTER 


the  families,  and  agreeable  in  society.  That  educa- 
tion is  aiways  wrong  which  raises  a woman  above  the 
duties  of  her  station. 

In  America,  female  education  should  have  for  its  ob- 
ject what  is  useful.  Young  ladies  should  be  taught  to 
speak  and  read  their  own  language  with  purity  and  ele- 
gance ; an  article  in  which  they  are  often  deficient. 
The  French  language  is  not  necessary  for  ladies.  In 
some  cases  it  is  convenient,  but  in  general  it  may  be 
considered  as  an  article  of  luxury.  As  an  accomplish- 
ment, it  may  be  studied  by  those  whose  attention  is  not 
employed  about  more  important  concerns. 

Some  knowledge  of  arithmetic  is  necessary  for  every 
lady.  Geography  should  never  be  neglected.  Belles- 
lettres  learning  seems  to  correspond  with  the  disposi- 
tions of  most  females.  A taste  for  poetry  and  fine 
writing  should  be  cultivated ; for  we  expect  the  most 
delicate  sentiments  from  the  pens  of  that  sex  which  is 
possessed  of  the  finest  feelings. 

A course  of  reading  can  hardly  be  prescribed  for  all 
ladies.  But  it  should  be  remarked  that  this  sex  can- 
not be  too  well  acquainted  with  the  writers  upon  human 
life  and  manners.  The  Spectator  should  fill  the  first 
place  in  every  lady’s  library.  Other  volumes  of  peri- 
odical papers,  though  inferior  to  The  Spectator , should 
be  read  ; and  some  of  the  best  histories. 

With  respect  to  novels,  so  much  admired  by  the 
young,  and  so  generally  condemned  by  the  old,  what 
shall  I say  ? Perhaps  it  may  be  said  with  truth  that 
some  of  them  are  useful,  many  of  them  pernicious,  and 
most  of  them  trifling.  A hundred  volumes  of  modern 
novels  may  be  read  without  acquiring  a new  idea. 
Some  of  them  contain  entertaining  stories,  and  where 
the  descriptions  are  drawn  from  nature,  and  irom 
characters  and  events  in  themselves  innocent,  the  peru- 
sal of  them  may  be  harmless. 

Where  novels  are  written  with  a view  to  exhibit  only 
one  side  of  human  nature,  to  paint  the  social  viitues, 
the  world  would  condemn  them  as  defective  : but  I 
should  think  them  more  perfect.  Young  people,  espe- 
cially females,  should  not  see  the  vicious  part  of  mankind. 
At  best,  novels  may  be  considered  as  the  toys  of  youth ; 


NOAH  IVEBSTE& 


53 


the  rattle-boxes  of  sixteen.  The  mechat  ic  gets  his 
pence  for  his  toys,  and  the  novel-writer  for  his  books, 
and  it  would  be  happy  for  society  if  the  latter  were  in 
all  cases  as  innocent  playthings  as  the  former. 

In  the  large  towns  in  America,  music,  drawing,  and 
dancing  constitute  a part  of  female  education.  They, 
however,  hold  a subordinate  rank  ; for  my  fair  friends 
will  pardon  me  when  I declare  that  no  man  ever  mar- 
ries a woman  for  her  performance  on  a harpsichord,  or 
her  figure  in  a minuet.  However  ambitious  a woman 
may  be  to  command  admiration  abroad,  her  real  merit 
is  known  only  at  home.  Admiration  is  useless  when  it 
is  not  supported  by  domestic  worth.  But  real  honor 
and  permanent  esteem  are  always  secured  by  those 
who  preside  over  their  own  families  with  dignity. 
Nothing  can  be  more  fatal  to  domestic  happiness  in 
America  than  a taste  for  copying  the  luxurious  manners 
and  amusements  of  England  and  France.  Dancing, 
drawing,  and  m tsic  are  principal  articles  of  education 
in  those  kingdoms,  therefore  every  girl  in  America  must 
pass  two  or  three  years  at  a boarding-school,  though  her 
father  cannot  give  her  a farthing  when  she  marries. 
This  ambition  to  educate  females  above  their  fortunes 
pervades  every  part  of  America.  Hence  the  dispropor- 
tion between  the  well-bred  females  and  males  in  our 
large  towns.  A mechanic  or  shopkeeper  in  town,  or  a 
farmer  in  the  country,  whose  sons  get  their  living  by 
their  father’s  employments,  will  send  their  daughters  to 
a boarding-school,  where  their  ideas  are  elevated,  and 
their  views  carried  above  a connection  with  men  in  those 
occupations.  Such  an  education,  without  fortune  or 
beauty,  may  possibly  please  a girl  of  fifteen  but  must 
prove  her  greatest  misfortune.  This  fatal  mistake  is 
illustrated  in  every  large  town  in  America.  In  the 
country,  the  number  of  males  and  females  is  nearly 
equal ; but  in  towns,  the  number  of  genteelly  bred 
women  is  greater  than  of  men  ; and  in  some  towns  the 
proportion  is  as  three  to  one. 

The  heads  of  young  people  of  both  sexes  are  often 
turned  by  reading  descriptions  of  splendid  living,  of 
coaches,  of  plays,  and  other  amusements.  Such  de- 
scriptions excite  a desire  to  enjoy  the  same  pleasures 


*54 


NOAH  WEBSTER 


A fortune  becomes  the  principal  object  of  pursuit ; 
fortunes  are  scarce  in  America,  and  not  easily  acquired  ; 
disappointment  succeeds,  and  the  youth  who  begins 
life  with  expecting  to  enjoy  a coach,  closes  the  prospect 
with  a small  living,  procured  by  labor  and  economy. 

Thus  a wrong  education,  a taste  for  pleasures  which 
our  fortunes  will  not  enable  us  to  enjoy,  often  plunge 
the  Americans  into  distress,  or  at  least  prevent  early 
marriages.  Too  fond  of  show,  of  dress  and  expense, 
the  sexes  wish  to  please  each  other  ; they  mistake  the 
means,  and  both  are  disappointed. — Essays  and  Writings. 

ENGLISH  CORRUPTION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  LANGUAGE. 

Our  language  was  spoken  in  purity  about  eighty  years 
ago ; since  which  time,  great  numbers  of  faults  have 
crept  into  practice  about  the  theatre  and  court  of  Lon- 
don. An  affected,  erroneous  pronuncia  aon  has  in  many 
instances  taken  the  place  of  the  true . and  new  words 
or  modes  of  speech  have  succeeded  the  ancient  correct 
English  phrases. 

Thus  we  have  in  the  modern  English  pronunciation 
their  natshures,  conjunctshures,  constitshutions,  and 
tshumultshuous  legislatshures  ; and  a catalogue  of  fash- 
ionable improprieties.  These  are  a direct  violation  of 
the  rules  of  analogy  and  harmony  ; they  offend  the  ear, 
and  embarrass  the  language.  Time  was  when  these 
errors  were  unknown  ; they  were  little  known  in  Amer- 
ica before  the  Revolution.  I presume  we  may  safely 
say  that  our  language  has  suffered  more  injurious 
changes  in  America  since  the  British  army  landed  on 
our  shores  than  it  had  suffered  before  in  the  period  of 
three  centuries.  The  bucks  and  bloods  tell  us  that 
there  is  no  proper  standard  in  language  ; that  it  is  all 
arbitrary.  The  assertion,  however,  serves  but  to  show 
their  ignorance.  There  are,  in  the  language  itself,  de- 
cisive reasons  for  preferring  one  pronunciation  to 
another  ; and  men  of  science  should  be  acquainted  with 
these  reasons.  But  if  there  were  none,  and  everything 
rested  on  practice,  we  should  never  change  a general 
practice  without  substantial  reasons  : no  change  should 
be  introduced  which  is  not  an  obvious  improvement. 


NOAH  WEBSTER 


■RuC  our  leading  characters  seem  to  pay  no  regard  to 
idles,  or  their  former  practice.  To  know  and  embrace 
every  change  made  in  Great  Britain,  whether  right  or 
wrong,  is  the  extent  of  their  inquiries  and  the  height  of 
their  ambition.  It  is  to  this  deference  we  may  ascribe 
the  long  catalogue  of  errors  in  pronunciation  and  of 
false  idioms  which  disfigure  the  language  of  our  mighty 
fine  speakers.  And  should  this  imitation  continue,  we 
shall  be  hurried  down  the  stream  of  corruption,  with 
older  nations,  and  our  language,  with  theirs,  be  lost  in 
an  ocean  of  perpetual  changes.  The  only  hope  we  can 
entertain  is  that  America,  driven  by  the  shock  of  a 
revolution  from  the  rapidity  of  the  current,  may  glide 
along  near  the  margin  with  a gentler  stream,  and  some- 
times be  wafted  back  by  an  eddy. — Essays  and  Writings . 


WELHAVEN,  Johan  Sebastian  Cammer- 
MEYER,  a Norwegian  poet  and  critic,  born  at 
Bergen,  December  20,  1807;  died  at  Christiania, 
October  21,  1873.  He  was  contemporary  with 
Henrik  Wergeland,  a student  at  Christiania  Uni- 
versity, and  a member  of  “ studentersamfundet  ” 
with  him.  Wergeland  had  already  a considerable 
reputation  as  a poet,  and  was  very  influential  in 
the  society,  where  his  radical  views  were  generally 
adopted.  Welhaven  first  attracted  attention  as  a 
clever  and  powerful  opponent  of  Wergeland  and 
his  views,  first  within  the  society,  and  later  out- 
side of  it.  His  first  published  work  was  entitled 
Wergeland' s Poetry  and  Polemics , and,  being  a de- 
fence of  the  “ official”  or  aristocratic  class  which 
was  still  dominant,  it  gave  the  author  much  pres- 
tige. He  improved  the  opportunity  to  make  a 
reputation  by  opposing  Wergeland,  and  withdrew 
from  “ studentersamfundet,”  founding  an  oppo- 
sition society  under  the  name  of  “ studenterbun  * 
det,”  to  which  all  the  opponents  of  Wergeland 
among  the  students  were  attracted.  From  that 
day  until  the  untimely  death  of  Wergeland  at  the 
age  of  thirty-eight,  Welhaven’s  chief  distinction 
was  that  of  an  adversary  of  Wergeland.  He  be- 
came the  editor  of  a literary  journal  called  Vidary 
and  also  in  1832  published  a volume  of  sonnets, 
entitled  Norge's  Daemring , which  in  the  bitterest 

(156) 


JOHAN  SEBASTIAN  CAMMERMEYER  WRLHAVEN 

manner  assailed  what  he  called  the  crime  against 
culture  of  the  “ studentersamfundet  ” and  its 
leader.  The  book  was  so  witty  and  satirical 
that,  although  it  aroused  a very  storm  of  protests, 
it  established  the  author’s  repute  as  a poet.  In 
1835  and  1836  he  spent  much  time  in  Denmark, 
France,  and  Germany,  during  which  time  he  wrote 
many  short  lyric  poems,  no  longer  wholly  of  a 
controversial  character.  In  1839  these  appeared 
in  his  first  volume  of  collected  poems.  In  1840 
he  was  given  the  chair  of  philosophy  in  the  Uni- 
versity of  Christiania,  and  from  that  time  through- 
out practically  the  whole  of  his  long  life  he  was  a 
professor  in  that  seat  of  learning.  He  occupied 
at  various  times  the  chairs  of  philosophy,  literary 
history,  archasology,  and  aesthetics.  He  published 
many  critical  essays  and  was  a frequent  contrib- 
utor of  verse  to  the  literary  periodicals.  Another 
and  completer  collection  of  his  verses  appeared  in 
1867. 

After  the  death  of  Wergeland  in  1845,  naturally 
the  virulence  of  the  attacks  upon  him  moderated. 
The  disagreement  between  the  two  however  was 
not  personal  at  bottom,  but  one  necessarily  aris- 
ing from  radical  differences  of  temperament  and 
political  belief.  In  political  matters,  Wergeland 
was  a radical  democrat  and  a strong  advocate 
of  everything  Norwegian,  as  distinguished  both 
from  Danish  and  Swedish.  Welhaven,  on  the 
other  hand,  espoused  the  cause  of  the  official  class, 
which  was  Danish  in  tradition,  and,  being  aristo- 
cratic in  tendency,  was  now  strongly  favorable  to 
the  absolute  sway  of  the  Swedish-Norwegian  King. 

i 


JOHAN  SEBASTIAN  CAMMERMEYER  XVELHA  VEN 

In  literary  matters,  the  contrast  was  scarcely 
less  complete.  The  Danish  and  Norwegian  roots 
being  closely  similar,  the  people  of  Norway  had 
during  the  occupation  used  the  Danish  written 
language,  but  in  ordinary  matters  their  own 
spoken  language.  Danish  was  the  language  of 
literature,  and  Danish  precedents  and  traditions 
governed  what  was  good  taste,  both  in  the  man- 
ner and  matter  of  literacy  productions.  One  of 
Wergeland’s  contentions  was  for  a genuinely  Norse 
literature,  a movement  which  had  been  inaugu- 
rated by  Wessel,  though  living  and  writing  in 
Denmark.  This  movement  was  destined  to  pro- 
duce the  great  Norwegian  poets  of  this  genera- 
tion, among  whom  are  numbered  Ibsen  and 
Bjornson.  But  in  that  day,  although  warmly 
supported  by  many  of  the  younger  men,  it  was 
distasteful  in  the  extreme  to  all  the  conservatives. 
Though  he  died  before  it  came,  the  victory 
was  with  Wergeland.  Liberal  and  even  demo- 
cratic ideas  got  the  upper  hand  in  Norway,  and 
in  literature  the  Norwegian  people  achieved  a 
thoroughly  independent  life.  Now,  except  by  the 
few  ultra-conservatives,  Welhaven  is  admired  only 
for  his  poetic  abilities,  and  his  controversial  liter- 
ature, whether  in  prose  or  verse,  is  neglected. 

The  style  of  Welhaven  partakes  of  the  usual 
imperfections  of  professional  literary  critics.  It 
betrays  the  self-consciousness  of  the  artist  who 
thought  rather  more  of  how  he  was  to  say  a 
thing  than  of  what  he  should  say.  His  long  al- 
legiance to  essentially  foreign  ideas  and  traditions 
did  not  improve  this.  As  a poet  he  is  not  ranked 

150 


johan  Sebastian  cammermeyer  welhaven 

so  high  as  his  iife-long  adversary  and  rival, 
Wergeland. 

Nothing  of  Welhaven’s  has  been  translated  into 
English,  so  far  as  we  can  ascertain  ; therefore  we 
have  had  two  of  his  shorter  poems  translated  by 
Miles  Menander  Dawson  especially  for  this  woik. 
These  two  poems  illustrate  both  that  bitter  satire 
which  first  earned  him  a reputation  and  that  veivj 
of  pure  poetry  which  alone  secures  that  repu 
tation  which  will  not  entirely  fade.  The  first  oi 
these,  being  on  the  same  subject,  may  be  con- 
trasted with  Burns’s  Tree  of  Liberty. 

1848. 

That  lofty  tree  of  liberty 

Which  all  the  world  is  dancing  round, 

Whose  paper  leaves  no  shelter  give, 

And  whose  false  fruit  is  empty  found  ; 

It  is  the  same  old  pole, 

With  tinsel  and  with  garlands  hung, 

About  which  once  before  men  thronged 
And  in  a short-lived  revel  swung. 

It  has  no  root,  it  bears  no  bud, 

Although  in  fertile  soil  it  stands  ; 

*Tis  hewed  and  planed  to  measure  and 
Stuck  in  the  ground  by  human  hands. 

The  signs  of  life  upon  it  that 
Forecast  of  summer  and  adorn  it 
Are  paper  leaves  or  evergreen, 

Withered  since  the  pine  has  worn  it. 

And,  when  I note  the  confidence 
That  this  tree  is  the  real  palm 
That  shall  be  like  a temple-vault 
O’er  a contented  people’s  calm, 


JOHAN  SEBASTIAN  CAMMERMEYER  WELHA  VEN 


Then  do  I test  my  sight  again, 

But  find  no  reason,  on  the  whole, 

To  change  my  first  conclusion  that 
The  tree  is  only  a May-pole. 

From  the  world’s  ancient  Ygdrasil 
Shall  many  a pole  be  hewed,  I fear, 
Before,  with  glory  and  acclaim, 

The  golden  era  shall  be  here. 

For  Adam’s  sons  there  must  be  made 
Another  earth  and  heaven  first ; 

Then  will  that  palm  tower  to  the  sky 

And  then  be  slaked  man’s  freedom-thirst  i. 

A MEMORY. 

I sat,  a light  tune  humming, 

Within  a chimney-nook, 

And  was  content  and  happy, 

A-reading  in  my  book. 

Then  to  me  rushed  the  mem’ries 
Of  childhood’s  joys  and  woes  : 

Many  that  lay  forgotten, 

From  their  dim  shores  arose. 

My  father  in  the  garden 

Sat,  watching  my  glad  game ; 

Bearing  a man  to  burial, 

With  chant  and  bell,  men  came. 

Two  children  sorely  weeping 
Beside  the  bier  walked  on  ; 

One  sobbed  as  if  his  heart  would  break, 
The  other  was  so  wan. 

And  then  my  father  took  me 
Into  his  arms  and  said  : 

“ Give  thanks  to  God,  my  darling; 

Your  father  is  not  dead.” 

Then  sank  into  my  spirit 
A vision  of  such  dread 
That  down  my  cheeks  a river 
Of  shining  tear-drops  sped. 


JOHAN  SEBASTIAN  CAMMERMEYER  WELHA  VRN 


There  wept  I long,  embracing 
My  father,  then  I knelt 
And  prayed  for  the  poor  children, 
Their  loss  as  mine  I felt. 

Far  from  that  garden  am  I ; 

Its  green  leaves  it  has  lost ; 

And,  oh,  so  far,  too,  from  the  grave 
That  holds  my  father’s  dust. 

This  winter  evening,  silent, 

I sit  in  chimney-nook 
And  read  ; but  tears  unbidden 
Are  falling  on  my  book 


WELLS,  David  Ames,  an  American  political 
economist,  born  at  Springfield,  Mass.,  June  17th, 
1828;  died  at  Norwich,  Conn.,  November  5th, 
1898.  He  was  graduated  at  Williams  College 
and  then  engaged  in  scientific  studies  at  Harvard 
under  Agassiz.  From  1850  to  i860  he  edited  a 
number  of  compiled  works  on  the  natural  sciences, 
and  in  1864  issued  a political  tract  entitled  Our 
Burden  and  Our  Strength , which  had  an  enormous 
circulation.  He  held  several  public  offices  from 
1866  to  1873.  He  was  at  first  a protectionist,  but 
later  became  a free-trader  and  wrote  numerous 
books  and  pamphlets  advocating  free  trade.  Be- 
sides his  reports  as  Government  and  State  Com- 
missioner there  have  appeared  The  Creed  of  the 
Free-Trader  (1875);  Why  We  Trade , and  How  We 
Trade  (1878);  Our  Merchant  Marine  (1882);  Practi- 
cal Economics  (1885),  and  Relation  of  the  Tariff  to 
Wages  (1888). 

“Mr.  Wells  would  have  us  believe,”  says  Mayo 
W.  Hazeltine,  in  his  reply  to  Mr.  Wells  regarding 
American  feeling  toward  Great  Britain,  “that  the 
minority  of  which  he  is  the  spokesman  is  what 
Matthew  Arnold  used  to  call  ‘the  saving  remnant,’ 
meaning  by  the  phrase  a body  of  men,  numerically 
weak,  but  strong  in  intellect  and  virtue,  who  may 
be  relied  upon  eventually  to  clarify  and  elevate 
the  whole  community.  We  have  seldom  seen  a 

more  extraordinary  perversion  of  recent  history 

(162) 


DAVID  AMES  WELLS 


than  is  presented  in  Mr.  Wells’s  account  of  Great 
Britain’s  relations  with  the  Transvaal.  Assuming 
that  through  British  Guiana’s  absorption  of  the 
whole  of  Venezuela  our  commodities  would  be  ad- 
mitted duty  free  to  that  vast  region,  are  we  on  that 
account  to  justify  the  extinction  of  a Latin  Ameri- 
can nationality  Pina  word,  if  the  remarkable  opin- 
ions propounded  by  Mr.  Wells  last  April  are 
pushed  to  their  logical  conclusions,  we  should  ar. 
rive  at  the  assertion  that  a free-trade  country  can 
do  no  wrong,  while,  on  the  other  hand,  protect 
tionist  countries  have  no  rights  that  anybody  need 
respect.” 

THE  OLD  AND  THE  NEW  IDEAS  IN  TAXATION. 

The  first  attempt  made  to  tax  money  at  interest  was 
instigated  against  money-lenders  because  they  were 
Jews  ; but  the  Jew  was  sufficiently  shrewd  to  charge  the 
full  tax  over  to  the  Christian  borrower,  including  a per- 
centage for  annoyance  and  risk  ; and  now  most  Chris- 
tian countries,  as  the  result  of  early  experience,  compel  or 
permit  the  Jew  to  enter  the  money-market,  and  submit, 
without  let  or  hindrance,  his  transactions  to  the  “high- 
er law”  of  trade  and  political  economy.  But  a class 
yet  exist  who  would  persecute  a Jew  if  he  is  a money- 
lender, and  they  regret  that  the  good  old  times  of 
roasting  him  have  passed  away.  They  take  delight  in 
applying  against  him,  in  taxation,  rules  of  evidence  ad- 
missible in  no  court  since  witches  have  ceased  to  be 
tried  and  condemned.  They  sigh  at  the  suggestion 
that  all  inquisitions  shall  be  abolished  ; they  consider 
oaths,  the  rack,  the  iron  boot,  and  the  thumb-screw  as 
the  visible  manifestations  of  equality.  They  would  tax 
primarily  everything  to  the  lowest  atom  ; first,  for  na- 
tional purposes,  and  then  for  State  and  local  purposes, 
through  separate  boards  of  assessors.  They  would  re- 
quire every  other  man  to  be  an  assessor  or  collector ; 
and  it  is  not  probable  that  the  work  could  then  be  ac* 
Vol.  XXIVt— XJ 


DAVID  AMES  WELLS 


164 

complished  with  accuracy.  The  average  consumption 
of  every  inhabitant  of  this  State  (New  York),  annually, 
is  at  least,  $200,  or  in  the  aggregate,  $800,000,000  ; and 
this  immense  amount  would  fail  to  be  taxed  if  the  as- 
sessment was  made  at  the  end  of  the  year,  and  not 
daily,  as  fast  as  consumption  followed  production.  All 
this  complicated  machinery  of  infinitesimal  taxation 
and  mediaeval  inquisition  is  to  be  brought  into  requisi- 
tion for  the  purpose  of  taxing  “ money  property,”  which 
is  nothing  but  a myth.  The  money-lender  parts  with 
his  property  to  the  borrower,  who  puts  it  in  the  form 
of  new  buildings,  or  other  improvements,  upon  which  he 
pays  a tax.  Is  not  one  assessment  on  the  same  prop- 
erty sufficient?  But  if  you  insist  upon  another  assess- 
ment on  the  money-lender,  it  requires  no  prophetic 
power  to  predict  that  he  will  add  the  tax  in  his  transac- 
tions with  the  borrower.  If  a tax  of  ten  per  cent,  were 
levied  and  enforced  on  every  bill  of  goods,  or  note 
given  for  goods,  the  tax  would  be  added  to  the  price  of 
the  goods  ; and  how  would  this  form  of  tax  be  different 
from  the  tax  on  the  goods  ? 

“ Money  property,”  except  in  coin,  is  imaginary,  and 
cannot  exist.  There  are  rights  to  property,  of  great 
value.  The  right  to  inherit  property  is  valuable  ; and 
a mortgage  on  land  is  a certificate  of  right  or  interest 
in  the  property,  but  it  is  not  the  property.  Land  under 
lease  is  as  much  “ money  property  ” as  a mortgage  on 
the  same  land  ; both  will  yield  an  income  of  money. 
Labor  will  command  money,  and  is  a valuable  power  to 
acquire  property,  but  is  not  property.  If  we  could 
make  property  by  making  debts  it  cannot  be  doubted 
that  a national  debt  would  be  a national  blessing.  At- 
tacking the  bugbear  of  “money  property  ” is  an  assault 
on  all  property  ; for  “ money  property  ” is  the  mere 
representative  of  property.  If  we  tax  the  representa- 
tive, the  tax  must  fall  upon  the  thing  represented. 

A traveller  in  the  Okefinokee  Swamp  slaps  the  mos- 
quitoes off  his  right  cheek  only  to  find  that  they  imme- 
diately alight  upon  his  left  cheek  ; and  that  when  he  has 
driven  them  from  thence,  they  return  and  alight  on  his 
nose  ; and  that  all  the  time  he  loses  blood  as  a genuine 
primary  or  secondary  tax-payer.  And  so  it  is  with  tax- 


DAVID  AMES  WELLS 


ation.  If  we  live  in  any  country  not  wholly  barbarous, 
we  cannot  escape  it ; and  it  is  the  fate  of  man  to  bear 
his  proportion  of  its  burdens  in  proportion  to  his  ex- 
pense, property,  and  consumption.  The  main  question 
of  interest  and  importance  in  connection  with  the  sub- 
ject, therefore,  is,  Shall  we  have  an  economical  system 
(and  hence  a species  of  labor-saving  machine),  and  a 
uniform  and  honest  system  ; or  one  that  is  expensive 
and  encourages  dishonesty,  and  is  arbitrary  and  inquisi= 
torial  ? In  either  case  the  tax-collector  will  act  the 
part  of  the  mosquito,  and  will  get  blood  from  all  ; but 
in  an  honest  and  economical  system  he  will  get  no  un- 
necessary blood. — Report  of  Commissioners  to  Revise  the 
Laws  for  Assessment  and  Collection  of  Taxes  in  the  State 
of  New  York,  i8ja. 


WELLS,  H.  G.,  an  English  novelist,  born  at 
Bromley  in  1866.  After  a course  at  the  Royal 
College  of  Science,  wherein  he  received  high  hon- 
ors, he  became  a school-master.  Then  he  entered 
journalism,  his  brilliant  articles  attracting  the  at- 
tention of  W.  E.  Henley.  Persuaded  to  turn  his 
talents  to  fiction,  he  produced  in  1895  The  Time 
Machine , which  achieved  a great  success  for  him. 
The  same  year  appeared  The  Stolen  Bacillus  and 
The  Wonderful  Visit.  In  1896  appeared  The  Island 
of  Doctor  Moreau , and  The  Wheels  of  Chance , a cy- 
cling romance.  In  1897  appeared  The  Invisible 
Man , The  Plattner  Story , and  the  work  which  has 
attracted  a greater  attention  than  any  of  his  other 
productions,  The  War  of  the  Worlds. 

“Mr.  Wells  has  a remarkable  faculty  of  in- 
vention,” says  the  Illustrated  London  News , “ and 
a still  more  remarkable  gift  of  persuasion.  You 
may  read  stories  quite  as  original  as  The  Invisible 
Mant  but  when  the  excitement  of  the  narrative  is 
over  the  glamor  vanishes,  and  common-sense  re- 
sumes its  sway.  Mr.  Wells’s  peculiarity  is  that  he 
not  only  claims  your  attention  when  you  are  actu- 
ally reading  him,  but  exercises  the  same  fascina- 
tion  over  your  subsequent  reflections.” 

“ Not  for  a long  time,”  says  The  Bookman , re- 
viewing The  Wheels  of  Chance , “ have  we  run 
across  a more  striking  instance  of  fresh  and  spon- 

Ci66j 


H.  G.  WELLS 


1*7 


taneous  humor.  The  characters,  though  extreme- 
ly amusing,  are  not  exaggerated  by  caricature, 
and  the  result  is  a collection  of  personages  so  de- 
lightfully and  convincingly  human  as  to  be  al- 
most too  unorthodox  for  a book — on  the  same 
principle  as  that  which  prompts  artists  to  conven- 
tionalize what  they  see  about  them,  for  fear  that 
their  pictures  will  be  regarded  as  untrue  to 
nature.” 

The  idea  of  the  time-machine  is  that  a man  in- 
vented a machine  by  which  he  could  travel  back, 
ward  and  forward  in  time,  and  describes  what  he 
sees  and  hears  when  he  projects  himself  several 
millions  of  years  into  the  future,  and  marks  the 
fate  of  our  planet  in  its  last  day.  At  the  time  of 
his  first  trip  mankind  had  developed  backward  on 
two  lines — the  well-to-do  and  aristocratic  section 
becoming  weak,  helpless,  amiable,  and  refined 
creatures,  who  lived  in  the  light  of  day  on  flowers 
and  fruits,  while  the  working-class,  relegated  to 
underground  caverns,  had  grown  into  loathsome 
vampire  fiends,  who  at  nightfall  came  to  the  sur- 
face of  the  earth  and  killed  the  delicate,  civilized 
race  that  lived  in  the  sunlight,  and  carried  them 
below  to  stock  their  larder.  On  his  second  trip 
he  projects  himself  many  more  millions  of  years 
ahead.  All  trace  of  civilization  has  disappeared, 
and  the  world  is  given  over,  so  far  as  he  can  see, 
to  degenerate  men  and  monstrous  insects. 

THE  MAN  OF  THE  FUTURE. 

I became  aware  of  a number  of  faint-gray  things, 
colored  to  almost  the  exact  tint  of  the  frost-bitten  soil, 
which  were  browsing  here  and  there  upon  its  scanty 


JR  G>  WELLS 


16S 

grass,  and  running  to  and  fro,  I saw  one  jump  with  a 
§ udden  start,  and  then  my  eye  detected  perhaps  a score 
of  them.  At  first  I thought  they  were  rabbits  or  some 
small  breed  of  kangaroo.  Then,  as  one  came  hopping 
near  me,  I perceived  that  it  belonged  to  neither  of  these 
groups.  It  was  plantigrade,  its  hind  legs  rather  the 
longer ; it  was  tailless,  and  covered  with  a straight 
grayish  hair  that  thickened  about  the  head  into  a Skye 
terrier’s  mane. 

Seizing  a stone  I knocked  one  of  them  on  the  head, 
and  on  taking  it  up  was  horrified  on  discovering  that 
it  was  indeed  a degenerate  and  miniature  man.  The 
thing  had  five  feeble  digits  to  both  its  fore  and 
hind  feet— the  fore  feet,  indeed,  were  also  as  human  as 
the  fore  feet  of  a frog.  It  had,  moreover,  a roundish 
head,  with  a projecting  forehead  and  forward-looking 
eyes,  obscured  by  its  lank  hair. 

When  studying  the  miserable  little  object  I heard  a 
sound  as  of  the  clanging  of  armor,  and  looking  round 
I saw  a monster  approaching  which  filled  me  with 
horror,  and  no  wonder.  I can  only  describe  it  by  com- 
paring it  to  a centipede.  It  stood  about  three  feet 
high  and  had  a long  segmented  body,  perhaps  thirty 
feet  long,  with  curiously  overlapping  greenish-black 
plates.  It  seemed  to  crawl  upon  a multitude  of  feet, 
looping  its  body  as  it  advanced.  It  had  a blunt,  round 
head,  with  a polygonal  arrangement  of  black  eye-spots. 

All  the  decadent  men  fled  like  rabbits.  I also  fled  on 
my  machine,  and  when  I returned  there  was  not  even 
a trace  of  the  bones  of  the  miserable  man,  whom  the 
colossal  centipede  had  devoured. 

Evidently  the  physiological  difficulty  that  at  present 
keeps  all  the  insects  small  had  been  surmounted  at  last, 
and  this  division  of  the  animal  kingdom  had  arrived  at 
the  long-awaited  supremacy  which  its  enormous  energy 
and  vitality  deserve. — From  The  Time  Machine. 

After  this  he  comes  upon  no  more  traces  of  hu- 
manity in  the  world.  His  machine  carries  him 
forward  some  more  millions  of  years,  and  then  he 
alights  again. 


H,  G WELLS 


A LAND  OF  ENDLESS  DAY. 

\ he  sun  had  ceased  to  set — it  simply  rose  and  fell  in 
the  West,  and  grew  ever  broader  and  more  red.  All 
trace  of  the  moon  had  vanished.  The  circling  of  the 
stars,  growing  slower  and  slower,  had  given  place  to 
creeping  points  of  light.  At  last,  some  time  before  I 
stopped,  the  sun,  red  and  very  large,  halted  motionless 
upon  the  horizon,  a vast  dome  glowing  with  a dull  heat, 
and  now  and  then  suffering  a momentary  extinction,  At 
one  time  it  had  for  a little  while  glowed  more  brilliantly 
again,  but  it  speedily  reverted  to  its  sullen  red-heat. 
I perceived  by  this  slowing  down  of  its  rising  and  setting 
that  the  work  of  the  tidal-drag  was  done.  The  earth  had 
come  to  rest  with  one  face  to  the  sun,  even  as  in  our  own 
time  the  moon  faces  the  earth. 

I found  myself  on  the  shore  of  a slumbering  sea,  the 
rocks  overgrown  with  dark-green,  lichenous  vegetation,  and 
the  shore  alive  with  monster  crabs,  one  of  which  made  a 
vicious  attack  upon  me.  Forward  again  for  another  vast 
space,  and  I once  more  find  myself  on  the  shore  of  the 
siient  sea,  but  all  the  crabs  have  disappeared,  and  the 
sun,  which  glows  continuously,  its  great  red  dome  shutting 
out  half  the  western  sky,  is  temporarily  eclipsed.  [This  is 
his  last  picture  of  the  end  of  the  world.] 

The  darkness  grew  apace ; a cold  wind  began  to  blow 
in  freshening  gusts  from  the  east,  and  the  showering 
white  flakes  in  the  air  increased  in  number.  From  the 
edge  of  the  sea  came  a ripple  and  whisper.  Beyond 
these  lifeless  sounds  the  world  was  silent.  Silent  ? It 
would  be  hard  to  convey  the  stillness  of  it.  All  the 
sounds  of  man,  the  bleating  of  sheep,  the  cries  of  birds, 
the  hum  of  insects,  the  stir  that  makes  the  background 
of  our  lives — all  that  was  over.  As  the  darkness 
thickened,  the  eddying  flakes  grew  more  abundant, 
dancing  before  my  eyes,  and  the  cold  of  the  air  more 
intense.  At  last,  one  by  one,  swiftly,  one  after  the 
other,  the  white  peaks  of  the  distant  hills  vanished  into 
blackness.  The  breeze  rose  to  a moaning  wind.  I saw 
the  black  central  shadow  of  the  eclipse  sweeping  toward 


170 


H.  G.  WELLS 


me.  In  another  moment  the  pale  stars  alone  were  vis- 
ible. All  else  was  rayless  obscurity.  The  sky  was  ab- 
solutely black. 

A horror  of  the  great  darkness  came  on  me.  The 
cold  that  smote  to  my  marrow,  and  the  pain  I felt  in 
breathing,  overcame  me.  I shivered  and  a deadly  nau- 
sea seized  me.  Then  like  a red-hot  bow  in  the  sky  ap- 
peared the  edge  of  the  sun.  I got  off  the  machine  to 
recover  myself.  I felt  giddy  and  incapable  of  facing 
the  return  journey.  As  I stood,  sick  and  confused,  I 
saw  again  the  moving  thing  upon  the  shoal — there  was 
no  mistake  now  that  it  was  a moving  thing — against  the 
red  water  of  the  sea.  It  was  a round  thing,  the  size  of 
a football,  perhaps,  or,  it  may  be,  bigger,  and  tentacles 
trailed  down  from  it ; it  seemed  black  against  the  wel- 
tering blood-red  water,  and  it  was  hopping  fitfully  about. 
Then  I felt  I was  fainting. — From  The  Time  Machine . 


WERGELAND,  Henrik  Arnold,  a celebrated 
Norwegian  poet,  born  at  Christiansand,  June  17, 
1808;  died  at  Christiania,  July  12, 1845.  He  evinced 
genius  as  a child,  and  was  the  author  of  verses  and 
caricatures  even  as  a school-boy.  In  1821,  when 
but  thirteen  years  of  age,  his  first  work,  a story 
entitled  Blodstenen  (The  Bloodstone),  was  printed 
in  Morgenbladet,  the  leading  daily  paper  of  Chris- 
tiania. In  1825,  at  the  age  of  seventeen,  he  was 
admitted  to  Christiania  University, and  during  his 
student  years  produced  a number  of  small  dramas 
and  farces,  the  first  of  which  especially  attracted 
attention.  At  this  period  he  wrote  under  a pseu- 
donym. He  became  a radical  democrat,  and  a yet 
more  radical  advocate  of  all  that  was  distinctively 
Norse  as  against  Danish.  Not  long  before,  Nor- 
way had  emerged  from  the  dominion  of  Denmark, 
to  become  associated  with  Sweden  under  one 
crown  but  as  an  independent  state.  The  national 
feeling  ran  high,  but  was  met  and  partially  re- 
pressed by  the  official  class,  which  had  so  long 
looked  to  Denmark  for  all  authority  that  its  tradi- 
tional influence  was  yet  most  powerful  in  all  that 
related  to  art,  literature,  and  culture.  Wergeland 
plunged  into  all  the  issues  that  arose,  taking  ever 
the  side  of  the  distinctively  Norwegian,  and  of  the 
masses  against  the  classes.  He  produced  a great 
epic  poem,  entitled  Creation , Humanity , and  the 

(171) 


172  HENRIK  ARNOLD  WERGRLAND 

Messiah , which  appeared  in  1830.  The  publication 
of  this  aroused  the  public  criticism  of  Welhaven, 
who  was  from  that  day  forth  destined  to  be  his 
most  important  opponent  and  rival.  Up  to  this 
time,  although  drifting  in  opposite  directions,  these 
two  men  were  members  of  the  “ studentersamfun- 
det  ” together,  and  their  battles  were  fought  out 
there.  W elhaven  now  withdrew  and  assumed  the 
leadership  of  the  aristocratic  opposition,  organiz- 
ing another  club  among  the  students,  known  as 
the  “ studenterbundet.”  Wergeland  was  not 
deterred  by  opposition,  and  became  more  and 
more  the  champion  of  the  weak  against  the 
strong,  and  of  the  peasantry  against  the  official 
class.  He  was  so  active  and  enthusiastic  that 
he  was  involved  in  several  long  and  expensive  law- 
suits. He  spent  the  summer  of  1831  in  Paris,  and 
in  1833,  having  completed  his  studies  as  a theo- 
logical student,  applied  for  an  appointment  as  a 
priest,  but  his  foes  were  influential  enough  to  pre- 
vent his  being  called  to  any  parish.  Thereupon  he 
took  up  the  study  of  medicine.  This  he  forsook 
when  the  post  of  amanuensis  for  the  university 
library  was  tendered  him.  In  1839,  as  a result  of 
his  growing  repute,  he  was  granted  a pension  by 
the  King.  He  published  a newspaper,  entitled 
For  Arbeidsclassen  (For  the  Working-Class). 

His  pen  was  never  idle ; dramas,  lyric  poems, 
epic  poems,  polemics,  and  a volume  on  The  Consti- 
tutional History  of  Norway  followed  one  another 
in  rapid  succession.  He  was  for  a time  also  the 
editor  of  Statsborgeren , the  chief  journal  of  the  lib- 
eral opposition.  One  cause  wnich  he  took  up  and 


HENRIK  ARNOLD  WERG ELAND  173 

carried  to  success  would  have  rendered  his  name 
memorable,  even  though  he  had  done  no  more. 
He  opened  the  doors  of  Norway  to  the  Jews,  The 
Norwegians  had  more  than  shared  the  ordinary 
Christian  prejudice  against  the  despised  race;  they 
had  excelled  all  others,  not  even  excepting  the 
Spaniards.  The  prohibition  against  the  residence 
of  Jews  in  Norway  was  absolute.  Wergeland  be- 
came impressed  with  the  injustice  and  inhumanity 
of  such  a prohibition,  and  he  attacked  the  law  by 
every  possible  means.  Some  of  his  greatest  poems 
dealt  with  the  Jews,  and  were  evidently  intended 
to  influence  the  people  of  Norway  to  remove  their 
offensive  statutes.  As  a token  of  their  gratitude 
and  honor,  the  Jews  of  Europe  have  built  a monu- 
ment to  him  over  his  grave.  There  is  also  a statue 
to  his  memory  in  Kragerat,  his  birthplace ; it  was 
unveiled  May  17,  1881. 

The  poetry  of  Wergeland  excels  in  eloquence. 
He  was  the  forerunner  of  Bjornson  especially,  but 
of  all  subsequent  Norwegian  literature  in  fact  He 
it  was  who  first  made  the  people  of  Norway  feel 
that  they  could  have  and  ought  to  have  a distinc- 
tive literature.  The  Pro-Norsk  movement,  of 
which  he  was  the  champion,  is  essentially  the  same 
movement  which,  not  many  years  after  his  death, 
Bjornstjerne  Bjornson  and  Henrik  Ibsen  took  up 
and  carried  to  victory.  He  sought  to  rescue  the 
Norwegian  stage  from  the  prevailing  Danish  in- 
fluence, and  to  create  a taste  on  the  part  of  the 
Norwegian  people  for  literature  in  the  language 
which  they  really  spoke,  and  dealing  with  things 
which  really  belonged  to  the  life  about  them.  The 


174  HENRIK  ARNOLD  WERGELAND 

Danish  and  Norwegian  languages  are  so  nearly 
alike  in  their  roots  that  it  had  been  possible  for 
the  people  to  speak  one  tongue  and  read  another, 
and  even  the  common  people  spoke  of  the  Danish 
as  “ real  Norsk.”  The  Danish  was  the  official  lan- 
guage of  the  courts  and  of  the  church,  and  there- 
fore it  was  also  the  shibboleth  of  the  cultured  and 
the  aristocratic,  there  being  no  titular  nobility  in 
Norway. 

Inasmuch  as  Norway  has  in  the  latter  half  of  the 
nineteenth  century  contributed  two  of  the  great- 
est poets  of  the  age,  and  inasmuch  as  the  trend  of 
the  Norwegian  Government  has  been  continually 
toward  liberty  and  democracy,  it  follows  that 
Wergeland  was  a true  poet.  He  was  at  once  a 
prophet  of  the  day  to  be  and  a real  maker  of  that 
day. 

His  chief  fame  rests  nuw  upon  his  accomplish- 
ments in  active  life,  such  as  his  crusade  in  favor  of 
the  Jews,  and  upon  his  lyric  verses.  His  dramas 
have  not  outlived  his  own  day  as  acting  plays,  and 
his  epic  poems  are  only  read  by  the  cultured  few 
of  his  own  countrymen  ; but  many  of  his  lyrics  are 
part  of  the  common  heritage  of  every  Norwegian 
child.  The  eloquence  of  his  style  made  him  un- 
usually effective  as  a writer  of  descriptive  and  in- 
terpretative poetry  about  the  scenery  of  his  na- 
tive land,  and  the  beautiful  things  of  nature.  He 
has  been  called  the  “ Byron  of  Norway,”  a com- 
mon enough  appellation  for  poets  of  his  day ; one 
received  the  name  in  nearly  every  country.  But 
in  the  one  faculty  of  remarkable  eloquence,  almost 
oratorical  rather  than  poetical  merely,  he  ap- 


HENRIK'  ARNOLD  WERGELAND 


m 


proaches  the  author  of  Childe  Harold  very  closely. 
His  work  was  so  thoroughly  national  that  little  of 
his  verse  has  been  translated.  The  age  for  literary 
work  which,  while  national  in  spirit,  should  be 
world-wide  in  theme,  had  not  yet  arrived  in  Nor- 
way. It  was  reserved  for  the  next  generation. 
We  have  had  translated  especially  for  this  work 
by  the  Scandinavian  scholar  and  poet,  Miles  Me- 
nander Dawson,  the  following  selections  from 
Wergeland’s  lyric  poems: 

SOGNE-FJORD. 

He  has  been  of  death  the  guest, 

He  has  sailed  on  waves  of  thunder 
And  all  terrors  has  dipped  under, 

Who  has  ploughed  the  seas  asunder 

Inland  unto  Sogne-faest. 

Hast  forgotten — every  word — 

The  Lord’s  Prayer?  Then  in  God’s  anger 
Learn  it  and — not  said  with  languor  ! 

Think  thyself  lost  in  the  clangor 

Of  the  storm  on  Sogne-fjord. 

Sogne-fjord’s  the  ocean’s  son. 

Cain-like,  he  is  inland  driven 
By  his  father,  unforgiven. 

Gloomed  by  mountains,  high  as  heaven, 

Of  your  prayers  he  harks  to  none. 

But  your  voice  in  prayer  to  raise 

Better  he  than  priests  can  teach  you  ; 

Make  your  inmost  heart  beseech,  you 
Recollect  the  pleading  speech  you 

Learned  to  use  in  childhood’s  days. 

Sogne-fjord  its  billows  holds 

To  their  path,  used  to  commanding,  - 


HENRIK  ARNOLD  WERGELAND 


i?6 


And  all  mortal’s  prayers  withstanding ; 
Even  his  own  storms  remanding 
Like  a sword  'neath  garment’s  folds. 

Doth  he  still  more  blackness  crave 

From  th’  o’ershadowing  cliff’s  dominions? 
Shoots  he  forth  then  the  black  pinions 
Of  the  sea-gull  from  the  minions 
Hovering  o’er  his  jagged  wave. 

As  if  chased  by  ravens  then, 

Where  the  fjord  in  black  cloud  closes, 
Does  it  speed  and  there  reposes, 

Sates  its  thirst  for  blackness,  dozes 
Till  ’tis  time  to  come  again. 

Then  one  hour  of  peace  is  reckoned, 

Peace  which  ends  when  the  gulls  scurry 
Back  once  more.  Then  if  one  hurry, 

He  that  hour  may  o’er  it  ferry, 

But — the  fjord  sleeps  not  a second. 

Without  respite  or  delay 

Hastes  he  to  his  sire  once  more, 

To  the  ocean  who  before 
Drave  his  son  thus  far  ashore, 

Wroth  at  his  demoniac  play. 

Thus  to  endless  hurry  doomed, 

Forth  and  back  in  wild  commotion 
He  between  the  cliff  and  ocean 
Is  perpetually  in  motion 
Till  time’s  portion  is  consumed. 

TO  MY  WALLFLOWER. 

My  wallflower,  ere  thy  bloom  shall  fade, 

I shall  be  that  of  which  all  is  made, 

Yea,  ere  thou  losest  thy  crown  of  gold, 

I shall  be  mould. 

When  I shall  call : “Put  the  window  up,“ 

I fhall  gaze  last  on  thy  golden  cup. 


HENRIK  ARNOLD  WERGELAND 

My  soul  shall  kiss  thee  as  hence  it  flies 
To  freer  skies. 

Thy  fragrant  petals  I twice  shall  kiss, 

Thine  own  and  only  the  first  one  is  : 

The  second,  give  it — forget  not,  dear— 

My  rose-bush  here. 

The  roses  blooming  I shall  not  see. 

So  give  my  message  when  that  shall  be, 

And  say  I wish  that  above  my  tomb 
My  rose  would  bloom. 

Ay,  say  I wish  that  the  rose  might  be 
Laid  on  my  breast  which  you  kiss  for  me. 
Its  nuptial  torch  in  death’s  house  that  hour, 
Be  thou,  wallflower  l 


WERNER,  Friedrich  Ludwig  Zacharias, 
a German  dramatic  poet,  born  at  Konigsberg, 
November  18,  1768  ; died  at  Vienna,  January  17, 
1823.  Friedrich  held  civil  office  in  several  places, 
travelled,  became  a Roman  Catholic  priest  in 
1 8 1 1 , and  was  a popular  preacher  at  Vienna. 
Much  impressed  by  the  death  of  his  mother  and 
of  a friend,  both  on  February  24th,  he  wrote  a 
tragic  piece  with  that  date  as  title,  and  this  led  to 
a series  of  fatalistic  tragedies,  written  by  him  and 
others,  termed  Destiny  Dramas.  Some  of  his  weird 
dramas  relate  to  mystical  societies  and  the  initia- 
tion of  candidates  into  spiritual  arcana. 

“Werner,”  sa)^s  Longfellow,  “ was  a poet  of  a 
rich  and  fertile,  though  eccentric  genius.  He 
was  particularly  distinguished  as  the  author  of 
some  of  the  most  remarkable  of  the  German 
Destiny  Dramas.”  “ The  highest  summit  of  this 
poetry  was  reached  by  Werner,”  says  Menzel, 
“ who  strove  to  elevate  it  to  tragical  dignity. 
Werner  endeavored  to  bring  about  this  eleva- 
tion and  improvement  by  converting  the  magical 
powers,  or  mystical  societies,  upon  whom  the 
guidance  and  probation  of  the  uninitiated  should 
be  dependent,  into  God’s  delegates,  and  brought 
the  whole  subject  of  the  marvellous  under  the 
religious  ideas  of  Providence  and  predestination. 
This  man  oossessed  the  fire  of  poetry,  and  still 


FRIEDRICH  LUDWIG  ZAC// ARIAS  WE  RATER  1 79 

more  of  passion,  but,  perhaps,  too  dry  a brain— 
for  who  can  deny  that  his  brain  was  a little 
scorched  ? ” 

STORY  OF  THE  FALLEN  MASTER. 

So  now,  when  the  foundation-stone  was  laid, 

The  Lord  called  forth  the  Master,  Baffometus, 

And  said  to  him,  “ Go  and  complete  thy  temple  ! ” 

But  in  his  heart  the  Master  thought  : “What  boots  it 
Building  Thee  a temple  ? ” and  took  the  stones, 

And  built  himself  a dwelling  ; and  what  stones 
Were  left  he  gave  for  filthy  gold  and  silver. 

Now  after  forty  moons  the  Lord  returned, 

And  spake  : “ Where  is  thy  temple,  Baffometus  ? ” 

The  Master  said  : “ I had  to  build  myself 
A dwelling  ; grant  me  other  forty  weeks.” 

And  after  forty  weeks,  the  Lord  returns, 

And  asks  : “Where  is  thy  temple,  Baffometus?’* 

He  said  : “ There  were  no  stones”  (but  he  had  sold  them 
For  filthy  gold) ; “so  wait  yet  forty  days.” 

In  forty  days  thereafter  came  the  Lord, 

And  cried  : “Where  is  thy  temple,  Baffometus?” 

Then  like  a millstone  fell  it  on  his  soul, 

How  he  for  lucre  had  betrayed  his  Lord  ; 

But  yet  to  other  sin  the  fiend  did  tempt  him, 

And  he  answered,  saying,  “Give  me  forty  hours  !” 

And  when  the  forty  hours  were  gone,  the  Lord 
Came  down  in  wrath  : “ My  temple,  Baffometus  ?” 

Then  fell  he,  quaking,  on  his  face,  and  cried 
For  mercy  ; but  the  Lord  was  wroth,  and  said  : 

“ Since  thou  hast  cozened  me  with  empty  lies, 

And  those  the  stones  I lent  thee  for  My  temple 
Hast  sold  them  for  a purse  of  filthy  gold, 

Lo  ! I will  cast  thee  forth,  and  with  the  mammon 

Will  chastise  thee,  until  a Saviour  rise 

Of  thy  own  seed,  who  shall  redeem  thy  trespass.” 

Then  did  the  Lord  lift  up  the  purse  of  gold ; 

And  shook  the  gold  into  a melting-pot, 

And  set  the  melting-pot  upon  the  sun, 

So  that  the  metal  fused  into  a fluid  mass, 

Vol»  xxiv.— ia 


I So  FRIEDRICH  LUDWIG  ZACHARIAS  WERNER 

And  then  He  dipped  a finger  in  the  same, 

And,  straightway,  touching  Baffometus, 

Anoints  him  on  the  chin  and  brow  and  cheeks. 

Then  was  the  face  of  Baffometus  changed  : 

His  eyeballs  rolled  like  fire-flames  ; 

His  nose  became  a crooked  vulture’s  bill ; 

The  tongue  hung  bloody  from  his  throat ; the  flesh 
Went  from  his  hollow  cheeks  ; and  of  his  hair 
Grew  snakes,  and  of  the  snakes  grew  Devils’  horns. 
Again  the  Lord  put  forth  His  finger  with  the  gold, 

And  pressed  it  upon  Baffometus’  heart ; 

Whereby  the  heart  did  bleed  and  wither  up, 

And  ail  his  members  bled  and  withered  up, 

And  fell  away,  the  one  and  then  the  other. 

At  last  his  back  itself  sunk  into  ashes  : 

The  head  alone  continued  gilt  and  living ; 

And  instead  of  back,  grew  dragons’  talons. 

Which  destroyed  all  life  from  off  the  earth. 

Then  from  the  ground  the  Lord  took  up  the  heart, 
Which,  as  He  touched  it,  also  grew  of  gold, 

And  placed  it  on  the  brow  of  Baffometus ; 

And  of  the  other  metal  in  the  pot 
He  made  for  him  a burning  crown  of  gold, 

And  crushed  it  on  his  serpent-hair,  so  that 

E’en  to  the  bone  and  brain  the  circlet  scorched  him  ; 

And  round  the  neck  he  twisted  golden  chains, 

Which  strangled  him  and  pressed  his  breath  together. 
What  in  the  pot  remained  He  poured  upon  the  ground, 
Athwart,  along,  and  there  it  formed  a cross  ; 

The  which  He  lifted  and  laid  upon  his  neck, 

And  bent  him  that  he  could  not  raise  his  head. 

Two  Deaths,  moreover,  He  appointed  warders 
To  guard  him  : Death  of  Life  and  Death  of  Hope. 

The  sword  of  the  first  he  sees  not,  but  it  smites  him ; 
The  other’s  palm  he  sees,  but  it  escapes  him. 

So  languishes  the  outcast  Baffometus 

Four  thousand  years  and  four  and  forty  moons, 

Till  once  a Saviour  rise  from  his  own  seed, 

Redeem  his  trespass,  and  deliver  him. 

This  is  the  story  of  the  Fallen  Master. 

— The  Templars  in  Cyprus. 


lift  UBU8Y 

OF  THE 

MUM  iil!  OF  ILUKHS 


WESLEY,  Charles,  an  English  clergyman  and 
hymnologist,  born  at  Epworth,  Lincolnshire,  De- 
cember 28,  1708;  died  in  London,  March  29,  1788. 
He  was  a younger  brother  of  John  Wesley,  with 
whom  he  studied  at  Christ  Church,  Oxford,  and 
with  whom  he  went  to  Georgia  in  1735,  returning 
with  him  to  England  after  about  two  years.  He 
was  an  earnest  colaborer  with  John  Wesley  in 
the  so-called  “ Methodist  ” movement,  was  an  elo- 
quent preacher,  and  a voluminous  writer  on  theo- 
logical topics.  Charles  Wesley  is  distinctively 
known  as  the  hymnist  of  the  Methodists,  and  many 
of  his  hymns  rank  among  the  best  in  our  language. 
From  his  mother  he  inherited  a high  musical 
genius,  which  he  transmitted  to  his  own  children, 
two  of  whom— Samuel  and  Charles — became  emi- 
nent composers. 

ETERNAL  BEAM  OF  LIGHT  DIVINE. 

Eternal  beam  of  light  divine, 

Fountain  of  unexhausted  love, 

In  whom  the  Father’s  glories  shine 
Through  earth  beneath,  and  heaven  above— 

Jesus,  the  weary  wanderer’s  rest, 

Give  me  Thy  easy  yoke  to  bear ; 

With  steadfast  patience  arm  my  breast. 

With  spotless  love  and  lowly  fear. 

Be  Thou,  O Rock  of  Ages,  nigh ! 

So  shall  each  murmuring  thought  begone  ; 

And  grief,  and  fear,  and  care  shail  fly, 

As  clouds  before  the  mid  day  sun. 


CHARLES  WESLEY 


Speak  to  my  warring  passions — “ Peace  ! ** 
Say  to  my  trembling  heart — “ Be  still  1” 
Thy  power  my  strength  and  fortress  is, 

For  all  things  serve  Thy  sovereign  will. 

O Death  ! where  is  thy  sting  ? Where  now 
Thy  boasted  victory,  O Grave  ? 

Who  shall  contend  with  God  ? or  who 
Can  hurt  whom  God  delights  to  save? 


on  Jordan’s  stormy  banks. 

On  Jordan’s  stormy  banks  I stand, 

And  cast  a wishful  eye 

To  Canaan’s  fair  and  happy  land, 

Where  my  possessions  lie. 

Oh,  the  transporting,  rapturous  scene 
That  rises  to  my  sight  ! 

Sweet  fields  arrayed  in  living  green, 

And  rivers  of  delight. 

There  generous  fruits,  that  never  fail, 

On  trees  immortal  grow  ; 

There  rock,  and  hill,  and  brook,  and  vale 
With  milk  and  honey  flow. 

O’er  all  those  wide-extended  plains 
Shines  one  eternal  day  ; 

There  God  the  Son  forever  reigns, 

And  scatters  night  away. 

No  chilling  winds,  or  poisonous  breath, 
Can  reach  that  healthful  shore  ; 

Sickness  and  sorrow,  pain  and  death, 

Are  felt  and  feared  no  more. 

When  shall  I reach  that  happy  place, 

And  be  forever  blest  ? 

When  shall  I see  my  Father’s  face, 

And  in  His  bosom  rest  ? 


CHARLES  WESLEY 


Filled  with  delight,  my  raptured  soul 
Would  here  no  longer  stay  : 

Though  Jordan’s  waves  around  me  roll, 
Fearless  I’d  launch  away. 

JESUS,  LOVER  OF  MY  SOUL. 

Jesus,  lover  of  my  soul, 

Let  me  to  Thy  bosom  fly, 

While  the  nearer  waters  roll, 

While  the  tempest  still  is  high  l 
Hide  me,  O my  Saviour,  hide, 

Till  the  storm  of  life  is  past ; 

Safe  into  the  haven  guide, 

0 receive  my  soul  at  last ! 

Other  refuge  have  I none  ; 

Hangs  my  helpless  soul  on  Thee  : 
Leave,  oh,  leave  me  not  alone, 

Still  support  and  comfort  me  : 

All  my  trust  on  Thee  is  stayed, 

All  my  help  from  Thee  I bring ; 
Cover  my  defenseless  head 
With  the  shadow  of  Thy  wing  ! 

Thou,  O Christ,  art  all  I want ; 

More  than  all  in  Thee  I find  ; 

Raise  the  fallen,  cheer  the  faint, 

Heal  the  sick,  and  lead  the  blind. 
Just  and  holy  is  Thy  name, 

1 am  all  unrighteousness  : 

False  and  full  of  sin  I am, 

Thou  art  full  of  truth  and  grace. 

Plenteous  grace  with  Thee  is  found, 
Grace  to  cover  all  my  sin  : 

Let  the  healing  streams  abound  ; 

Make  and  keep  me  pure  within. 
Thou  of  life  the  fountain  art, 

Freely  let  me  take  of  Thee  : 

Spring  Thou  up  within  my  heart, 

Rise  to  all  eternity. 


WESLEY,  John,  an  English  divine,  founder  of 
Methodism,  born  at  Epworth,  June  28,  1703;  died 
in  London,  March  2,  1791.  His  father,  Samuel 
Wesley  (1662-1735),  for  forty  years  rector  of  Ep- 
worth, was  the  author  of  several  works,  among 
which  are  a Life  of  Christ  and  a ponderous  folio 
in  Latin,  of  Dissertations  on  the  Book  of  fob.  His 
mother,  Susannah  Wesley  (1669-1742),  a woman 
of  much  talent  and  devoted  piety,  had  a strong 
influence  in  the  development  of  her  seventeen 
children,  several  of  whom  attained  considerable 
eminence. 

John  Wesley,  the  fourth  son,  was  placed,  at 
the  age  of  eleven,  in  the  Charterhouse  School 
at  London.  At  sixteen  he  was  elected  to  Christ 
Church  College,  Oxford,  and  at  twenty-three 
was  chosen  a Fellow  of  Lincoln  College,  and 
soon  afterward  was  made  Master  of  Arts  and 
Greek  Lecturer  and  Moderator  of  the  Classes. 
At  this  period  he  is  described  as  “ a superior  clas- 
sical scholar,  a thoughtful  and  polished  writer, 
and  a skilful  logician.”  He  was  admitted  to  dea- 
con’s orders  in  the  Anglican  Church  in  1725,  to 
priest’s  orders  in  1728,  and  acted  for  some  time 
as  curate  to  his  father,  but  was  subsequently 
summoned  back  to  his  official  duties  at  Oxford. 
While  here,  John  Wesley,  his  brother  Charles,  and 


JOHN  WESLEY, 


11JE  UBftAft? 

OF  THE 

ttlHtft  jilt  OF  HittOU 


JOHN  WESLEY 


several  other  students  formed  themselves  into  a 
club,  for  religious  study,  the  members  of  which 
were  jeeringly  styled  “ Methodists/’  on  account  of 
the  strict  mode  of  life  which  they  adopted.  This 
name  has  been  adopted  by  the  followers  of  Wes- 
ley in  the  United  States,  but  in  Great  Britain  they 
usually  style  themselves  “ Wesleyans.”  In  1735 
he  was  invited  by  General  Oglethorpe  to  go  out 
with  him  as  missionary  chaplain  to  his  colony  of 
Georgia. 

He  remained  here  more  than  two  years,  when 
he  returned  to  England.  In  London  he  fell  in 
with  Peter  Bohlen,  a Moravian  preacher,  from 
whose  discourse  he  became  convinced  of  the  pos- 
sibility of  a far  higher  state  of  religious  life  than 
he  had  ever  known.  Indeed,  he  considers  himself 
to  have  been  an  “ unconverted  ” man  until  May, 
1748,  when,  listening  to  the  reading  of  Luther’s 
comments  upon  “justification  by  faith,”  he  “felt 
his  heart  strangely  warmed  ” by  an  altogether 
new  religious  feeling.  He  soon  afterward  visited 
Herrnhut,  the  chief  seat  of  the  Moravians,  in  Ger- 
many, and  on  his  return  began  what  was  to  be 
the  work  of  his  life.  He  did  not  propose  to  sepa- 
rate himself  from  the  Anglican  Church ; and  never 
did  formally  leave  it.  He  claimed  it  to  be  his 
right,  and  felt  it  to  be  his  duty,  to  preach  the 
Gospel  whenever  and  wherever  he  could  find  an 
audience — out  of  doors  or  indoors — and  that  no 
incumbent  or  bishop  had  a right  to  inhibit  his 
ministrations  within  their  respective  parishes  or 
dioceses. 

The  Bishop  of  Bristol  having  loftily  announced 


i86 


JOHN  WESLEY 


that  Wesley  had  “no  business  to  preach  within 
his  diocese,”  Wesley  replied: 

WESLEY,  TO  THE  BISHOP  OF  BRISTOL. 

My  business  on  earth  is  to  do  what  good  I can  ; 
wherever,  therefore,  I think  I can  do  most  good,  there 
I must  stay,  so  long  as  I think  so.  At  present  I think  I 
can  do  most  good  here  ; therefore  here  I stay.  Being 
ordained  a priest,  by  the  authority  I then  received,  I 
am  a priest  of  the  Church  Universal  ; and  being  or- 
dained Fellow  of  a College,  I was  not  limited  to  any 
particular  cure,  but  to  have  an  indeterminate  commis- 
sion to  preach  the  Word  of  God  in  any  part  of  the 
Church  of  England.  I conceive  not  therefore  that  in 
preaching  here  by  this  commission  I break  any  human 
law.  When  I am  convinced  I do,  then  it  will  be  time  to 
ask,  Shall  I obey  God  or  man  ? But  should  I be  con- 
vinced in  the  meanwhile  that  I could  advance  the  glory 
of  God  and  the  salvation  of  souls  in  another  place  more 
than  in  Bristol,  in  that  hour,  by  God’s  help,  I will  go 
hence,  which  till  then  I may  not  do. 

He  was  soon  convinced  upon  this  point.  He 
had  organized  a church  at  Bristol  as  early  as 
April,  1739.  In  July,  1740,  he  made  a formal  or- 
ganization in  London,  and  began  his  work  as  a 
minister  without  the  supervision  of  the  bishops 
of  the  Established  Church.  He  indeed  considered 
himself,  in  virtue  of  his  ordination,  as  much  a 
bishop  of  the  Church  as  any  other  man,  with  as 
much  authority  to  confer  ordination  as  any  other 
bishop.  This  ministry  of  his  continued  for  fully 
fifty  years,  during  which  he  travelled  about  4,500 
miles  every  year,  generally  preached  two,  three, 
or  even  four  times  a day,  supervised  all  the  de- 
tails of  his  “ bishopric,”  which  comprehended  all 


JOHN  WESLEY 


i87 


the  British  Islands  ; carried  on  an  immense  cor- 
respondence, and  conducted  a great  publishing 
business,  all  the  profits  of  which  inured  to  his 
Society,  which  at  his  death  numbered  more  than 
120,000  enrolled  members,  besides  which  were  at 
least  four  times  as  many  regular  attendants  upon 
Wesleyan  ministrations.  He  continued  his  active 
labors  to  the  very  close  of  his  life ; his  last  ser- 
mon being  delivered  onty  eight  days  before  his 
death,  in  his  eighty-eighth  year.  He  naturally 
extended  his  spiritual  jurisdiction  over  the  Brit- 
ish colonies.  This  supervision  was  continued 
after  the  colonies  in  America  had  achieved  their 
independence;  and  in  1784  he  proceeded  to  or- 
ganize the  Methodists  in  the  United  States  into 
a separate  Episcopal  body,  for  whose  use  he  com- 
piled a liturgy,  and  ordained  Thomas  Coke  and 
Francis  Asbury  as  missionary  bishops. 

To  Asbury,  who  had  been  for  several  years 
laboring  in  America,  and  to  Coke,  who  was  just 
to  embark  thither,  Wesley  addressed  a formal 
statement  of  the  reasons  which  had  induced  him 
to  take  this  step. 

WESLEY,  TO  THE  METHODIST  BISHOPS. 

Lord  King’s  Account  of  the  Primitive  Church  con- 
vinced me  many  years  ago  that  Bishops  and  Presbyters 
are  the  same  Order,  and  consequently  have  the  same 
right  to  ordain.  For  many  years  I have  been  impor- 
tuned from  time  to  time  to  exercise  this  right  by  or- 
daining a part  of  our  travelling  preachers.  But  I have 
still  refused ; not  only  for  peace’s  sake,  but  because  I 
was  determined  as  little  as  possible  to  violate  the  es- 
tablished order  of  the  national  Church  to  which  I be- 
long. 


188 


JOHN  WESLEY 


But  the  case  is  widely  different  between  England  and 
North  America.  Here  there  are  Bishops  who  have  a 
legal  jurisdiction.  In  North  America  are  none,  neither 
any  parish  minister  ; so  that  for  hundreds  of  miles  to- 
gether there  is  none  either  to  baptize  or  administer  the 
Lord’s  Supper.  Here,  therefore,  my  scruples  are  at  an 
end  ; and  I conceive  myself  at  full  liberty,  as  I violate 
no  order,  and  invade  no  man’s  rights,  by  appointing 
and  sending  laborers  into  the  harvest.  . . . 

If  anyone  will  point  out  a more  rational  and  script- 
ural way  of  feeding  and  guiding  these  poor  sheep  in 
the  wilderness,  I will  gladly  embrace  it.  At  present  I 
cannot  see  any  better  method  than  that  I have  taken. 

It  has  been  indeed  proposed  to  invite  the  English 
Bishops  to  ordain  part  of  our  preachers  for  America. 
But  to  this  I object : (i)  I desired  the  Bishop  of  London 
to  ordain  one,  but  could  not  prevail.  (2)  If  they  con- 
sented, we  know  the  slowness  of  their  proceedings  ; 
but  the  matter  admits  of  no  delay.  (3)  If  they  would 
ordain  them  now,  they  would  likewise  expect  to  govern 
them.  And  how  grievously  would  this  entangle  us ! 
(4)  As  our  A.merican  brethren  are  now  totally  disen- 
tangled both  from  the  State  and  from  the  English  hier- 
archy, we  dare  not  entangle  them  again  either  with  the 
one  or  the  other.  They  are  now  at  full  liberty  to  fol- 
low the  Scriptures  and  the  Primitive  Church.  And  we 
judge  it  best  that  they  should  stand  fast  in  that  liberty 
wherewith  God  hath  so  strangely  made  them  free. 

Viewed  in  the  light  of  its  results,  this  act  of 
Wesley,  performed  at  the  age  of  fourscore,  was 
the  most  important  of  his  life.  From  it  resulted 
the  form  taken  by  the  Methodist  Church  in  Am- 
erica, which  differs  materially  from  that  estab- 
lished by  him  in  Great  Britain,  and  has  far  out- 
stripped it  in  numbers  and  efficiency. 

Wesley  discouraged  the  marriage  of  his  preach- 
ers; but  at  the  age  of  fifty-four  he  himself  was 
married  to  Mrs.  Vazeille,  the  widow  of  a wealthy 


JOHN"  WESLEY 


T8) 

London  merchant.  The  connection  proved  a most 
uncongenial  one,  and  in  a few  years  a formal  sep- 
aration took  place.  She  survived  this  separation 
for  twenty  years ; he  for  thirty.  The  Life  of  Wes- 
ley has  been  well  written  by  Robert  Southey  (1820), 
and  in  very  minute  detail  by  the  Rev.  Luke  Tyer- 
man  (1857).  The  works  of  Wesley  are  very  nu- 
merous. They  embrace  sermons,  essays,  transla- 
tions, and  abridgments,  many  of  them  designed 
for  text-books  in  the  schools  of  his  societies.  He 
also  wrote  many  hymns,  in  part  free  translations 
from  German  hymnists.  In  theology  he  belonged 
to  the  Arminian  as  distinguished  from  the  Cal- 
vinistic  school.  Of  his  dogmatic  productions  the 
most  notable  is  his  sermon  on  “ Free  Grace,”  from 
the  text  Romans  viii.  32.  Several  of  Wesley’s  as- 
sociates, notably  Whitefield,  were  extreme  Calvin- 
ists, and  to  him  the  sermon  was  addressed  upon 
its  publication.  At  the  close  Wesley  thus  sums 
up  his  arraignment  of  the  Calvinistic  doctrine  of 
Predestination: 

THE  DOCTRINE  OF  PREDESTINATION. 

Though  you  use  softer  words  than  some,  you  mean 
the  selfsame  thing  : and  God’s  decree  concerning  the 
Election  of  Grace,  according  to  your  account  of  it, 
amounts  to  neither  more  nor  less  than  what  others  call 
“ God’s  Decree  of  Reprobation.”  Call  it  therefore  by 
what  name  you  please — Election,  Pretermission,  Predes- 
tination, or  Reprobation — it  comes  in  the  end  to  the 
same  thing.  The  sense  of  all  is  plainly  this  : By  virtue  of 
an  eternal,  unchangeable,  irresistible  decree  of  God,  one 
part  of  mankind  are  infallibly  saved,  and  the  rest  in- 
fallibly damned  ; it  being  impossible  that  any  of  the 
former  should  be  damned,  or  that  any  of  the  latter  should 
be  saved,  . . . 


190 


JOHN  WESLEY 


This  do^mne  is  full  of  blasphemy,  for  it  represents 
our  blessed  Lord  as  a hypocrite  and  dissembler  in  say- 
ing one  thing  and  meaning  another  ; in  pretending  a 
love  which  He  has  not.  It  also  represents  the  most 
Holy  God  as  more  false,  more  cruel,  and  more  unjust 
than  the  Devil  : for  in  point  of  fact  it  says  that  God  has 
condemned  millions  of  souls  to  everlasting  fire  for  con- 
tinuing in  sin  which,  for  want  of  grace  He  gives  them 
not,  they  are  unable  to  avoid.  . . . 

This  is  the  blasphemy  clearly  contained  in  the  horrible 
decree  of  Predestination.  And  here  I fix  my  foot.  On 
this  I join  issue  with  every  asserter  of  it.  You  repre- 
sent God  as  worse  than  the  Devil.  But  you  say  you 
will  prove  it  by  Scripture.  Hold  ! What  will  you  prove 
by  Scripture  ? That  God  is  worse  than  the  Devil  ? It 
cannot  be.  Whatever  the  Scripture  proves,  it  can  never 
prove  this.  Whatever  its  true  meaning  may  be,  this 
cannot  be  its  true  meaning.  Do  you  ask,  “What  is  its 
true  meaning,  then  ? ” If  I say,  “ I know  not,”  you  have 
gained  nothing ; for  there  are  many  Scriptures  the  true 
sense  whereof  neither  you  nor  I shall  know  till  death 
is  swallowed  up  in  victory. 

DIVINE  LOVE. 

Thou  hidden  Love  of  God  ! whose  height, 

Whose  depth  unfathomed,  no  man  knows, 

I see  from  far  Thy  beauteous  light, 

Only  I sigh  for  Thy  repose. 

My  heart  is  pained,  nor  can  it  be 

At  rest  till  it  finds  rest  in  Thee. 

Thy  secret  voice  invites  me  still 

The  sweetness  of  Thy  yoke  to  prove  ; 

And  fain  I would  ; but  though  my  will 
Seem  fixed,  yet  wide  my  passions  rove, 

Yet  hindrances  strew  all  the  way  ; 

I aim  at  Thee,  yet  from  Thee  stray. 

*Tis  mercy  all,  that  Thou  hast  brought 
My  mind  to  seek  her  peace  in  Thee  ! 

Yet  while  I seek,  but  find  Thee  not, 

No  peace  my  wandering  soul  shall  see. 


JOHN  WESLEY  191 

Oh,  when  shall  all  my  wanderings  end, 

And  all  my  steps  to  Theeward  tend  ? 

Is  there  a thing  beneath  the  sun 

That  strives  with  Thee  my  heart  to  share  ? 
Ah,  tear  it  thence,  and  reign  alone, 

The  Lord  of  every  motion  there  ! 

Then  shall  my  heart  from  earth  be  free, 

When  it  hath  found  repose  in  Thee. 

Oh,  hide  this  self  from  me,  that  I 
No  more — but  Christ  in  me — may  live! 

My  vile  affections  crucify, 

Nor  let  one  darling  lust  survive! 

In  all  things  nothing  may  I see, 

Nothing  desire  or  seek  but  Thee  ! 

O Love  ! Thy  sovereign  aid  impart 
To  save  me  from  low-thoughted  care ; 

Chase  this  self-will  through  all  my  heart, 
Through  all  its  latent  mazes  there ; 

Make  me  Thy  duteous  child,  that  I 
Ceaseless  may  “ Abba,  Father,”  cry. 

Ah,  no  ! ne’er  will  I backward  turn — 

Thine,  wholly  Thine,  alone  I am  ; 

Thrice  happy  he  who  views  with  scorn 
Earth’s  toys,  for  Thee  his  constant  flame. 

Oh,  help,  that  I may  never  move 
From  the  blest  footsteps  of  Thy  love ! 

Each  moment  draw  from  earth  away 
My  heart,  that  lowly  waits  thy  call ; 

Speak  to  my  inmost  soul,  and  say, 

“I  am  thy  Love,  thy  God,  thy  All!” 

To  feel  Thy  power,  to  hear  Thy  voice, 

To  taste  Thy  love,  be  all  my  choice. 

— From  the  German  of  Gerhard  Tersteegen? 


WESSEL,  Johan  Hermann,  a Norwegian  poet, 
born  near  Christiania,  1742  ; died  in  Copenhagen, 
December  29,  1785.  He  lived  in  Copenhagen, 
Denmark,  throughout  his  literary  life,  Norway 
then  being  a province  of  Denmark.  He  was  one 
of  thirteen  children.  His  father  was  a curate  for 
an  uncle,  a priest  at  Westby,  two  Norwegian 
miles  south  of  Christiania,  on  the  fjord.  On  his 
uncle’s  death  his  father  succeeded  him  as  priest. 
Wessel  was  educated  first  at  an  academy  at  Chris- 
tiania, and  then  at  the  University  of  Copenhagen. 
He  was  very  apt,  but  of  weak  physique,  indo- 
lent, irregular  in  his  habits,  and  improvident  to 
the  last  degree.  He  was  a frequenter  of  public- 
houses  and  fond  of  jovial  company.  His  first  and 
greatest  work  was  a satirical  drama,  entitled  Kaer - 
ligheden  uden  Stromper  (Love  without  Stockings). 
It  was  a satire  upon  the  stilted,  foreign  tragedies 
of  the  time  which  dominated  the  Danish  stage,  to 
the  exclusion  of  all  native  themes.  The  play  was 
written  within  a period  of  six  weeks,  and  was  pub- 
lished in  1772  before  being  offered  for  stage  pres- 
entation. It  was  at  once  popular,  and  about  six 
months  later,  in  March,  1773,  it  appeared  upon 
the  boards  and  was  immediately  successful.  The 
great  men  of  the  day  were  delighted  with  it. 
Among  others,  the  famous  sculptor,  Thorwaldsen, 
learned  it  by  heart,  and  many  years  afterward 
could  repeat,  with  apparent  pleasure,  the  best 


JOHAN  HERMANN  WESSEL  193 

passages.  Wessel’s  Norwegian  biographer  says  of 
it:  “ Wessel  won  suddenly  within  a few  months  a 
reputation  unparalleled  in  Danish  literary  history.” 

Although  living  and  working  in  Denmark, 
Wessel  was  true  to  Norwegian  traditions.  The 
collective  Scandinavian  traditions  and  language 
as  well  had  been  preserved  in  greater  purity  in 
Norway  than  in  either  Denmark  or  Sweden,  be- 
cause less  exposed  to  foreign  influences.  Wessel 
was  perhaps  the  most  active  founder  in  that  day 
of  what  was  to  become  the  distinctive  Norwegian 
literature.  Thus,  with  talented  associates,  he  or- 
ganized the  Norwegian  Society  at  Copenhagen, 
which,  in  opposition  to  the  Danish  Literary  Soci- 
ety, stood  for  a literature  which  smacked  of  the 
genuine,  unspoiled  Scandinavian  quality.  In  con- 
junction with  other  members  of  this  society,  Wes- 
sel wrote  many  occasional  poems  which  added 
to  his  fame,  but  he  was  so  careless  concerning 
them  that  much  rubbish  was  written  and  given 
out.  He  wrote  a farce,  Luck  without  Brains , which 
was  unsuccessfully  produced. 

He  underwent  a long  illness  that  completely 
undermined  his  strength,  and  became  addicted  to 
drinking  to  excess.  For  some  time  he  was  in  ex- 
treme poverty.  An  appointment  as  official  trans- 
lator for  the  theatre  was  secured  for  him,  he  hav- 
ing excelled  in  modern  languages.  On  the  hopes 
of  income  raised  by  this  appointment,  he  married 
a portionless  Norwegian  lady  of  good  family. 
The  income  turned  out  to  be  about  $150  a year. 
His  irregular  and  destructive  habits  continued 
after  the  marriage,  th^  issue  of  which  was  one 


*94  JOHAN  HERMANN  WESSEL 

son.  In  1784  he  started  a weekly  paper  in  verse, 
which  was  at  first  popular  and  bade  fair  to  be  suc- 
cessful, but  he  put  into  it  any  nonsense  that  came 
into  his  head,  and  after  fifty-four  numbers  it  had 
to  be  abandoned.  His  last  work  was  Anno  y6oj , 
a play  in  seven  acts,  which  was  a failure.  After 
his  death  money  was  raised  by  subscription  to 
support  and  educate  his  son. 

His  great  satirical  drama  Kaerligheten  uden 
Stromper  turns  upon  the  fancy  which  a young 
woman  gets  into  her  head  that  unless  she  weds 
that  very  day,  she  will  never  wed  at  all.  The 
solution  of  her  difficulties  is  complicated  by  the 
fact  that  the  suitor  whom  she  prefers  is  absent. 
The  haste  brings  about  many  ridiculous  situations. 
But  the  charm  of  the  work  lay  mainly  in  the 
poet’s  ability  to  imitate  the  stilted  language  of  the 
tragic  stage.  The  play  has  not  so  much  interest 
nowadays,  the  thing  then  satirized  being  com- 
paratively unfamiliar.  Wessel’s  long  popularity, 
which  is  exceptional,  rests  principally  on  his 
shorter  poems ; because  of  which,  as  well  as  his 
dissipated  life  and  unpolished  language,  he  is 
called  the  Burns  of  Scandinavia,  although  he 
never  reached  the  heights  which  the  Scotch  bard 
attained.  His  vein  of  humor,  however,  bears  a 
marked  resemblance  to  that  of  Burns.  This  ap- 
pears especially  in  poems  in  character  and  in  epi- 
taphs. For  instance,  this,  which  was  written  as 
his  own  epitaph  : 

“ He  ate  and  drank,  was  happy  never; 

He  ran  his  boot-heels  over  ever. 


JOHAN  HERMANN  WESSEL 


195 


He  nothing  worth  the  while  could  do  : 

At  last  he  gave  up  living,  too.” 

No  translations  of  his  poems  have  been  pub- 
lished in  English,  so  far  as  can  be  ascertained. 
But  many  of  his  conceits  have  reached  us  in  an 
adapted  form.  For  instance,  the  apocryphal  story 
about  Lincoln  which  runs:  Lincoln,  in  defending 
a man  who  had  killed  a dog  with  a pitchfork,  was 
met  with  the  argument  that  his  client  ought  to 
have  presented  the  butt  of  the  handle  instead  of 
the  tine ; to  which  Lincoln  replied  that  so  he  would 
have  done,  if  the  dog  had  also  presented  that  end. 
This  is  merely  a version  of  Wessel’s  famous  poem 
“ Hundemordet  ” (The  Dog’s  Murder). 

We  have  secured  and  here  present  to  our  read- 
ers a metrical  translation  into  English  by  the 
Scandinavian  scholar,  Miles  Menander  Dawson, 
of  Smeden  and  Bageren  (The  Blacksmith  and 
Baker),  which  is  considered  one  of  Wessel’s  most 
characteristic  poems  2 

THE  BLACKSMITH  AND  THE  BAKER. 

A little  country  village  a mighty  blacksmith  had, 

A dangerous  curmudgeon  whenever  he  got  mad. 

He  made  an  enemy  (a  thing  not  hard  to  do, 

Though  I have  none  and  you, 

Friend,  have  of  course  none,  too). 

Unfortunately  for  them  they 
Met  in  the  public-house  one  day. 

They  took  a dram.  (I,  too,  drink  at  the  i no, 

And  for  no  other  purpose  go  therein. 

Observe,  dear  reader,  this  of  me  : 

I always  do  things  openly.) 

As  I remarked,  they  took  a dram. 

Then  they  began  to  curse  and  damn ; 
vol.  xxiv.-t* 


icj6  JOHAN  HERMANN  IV ESS EL 

The  blacksmith  smacked  his  foeman’s  noddle 
And  knocked  him  flat — he  could  not  toddle 
Nor  ope  his  eyes  again, 

Nor  has  he,  friend,  since  then. 

Straightway  the  blacksmith  was  arrested, 
Locked  up,  arraigned,  identified. 

The  coroner  sat  on  him  that  died 
And  to  his  violent  end  attested. 

The  smith’s  sole  outlook  was  to  go 
Where  he  might  get  forgiveness  from  his  foe. 
But  hear  my  tale  ! The  day  before 
The  sentence  was  to  be  pronounced, 

Into  the  court  came  burghers  four 

And  through  their  spokesman  this  announced 

“We  know,  your  honor,  in  all  you  do 
The  city’s  welfare  you  have  in  mind. 
Therefore  we  now  petition  you 
Our  blacksmith  back  to  us  to  give. 

His  death  won’t  make  the  dead  man  live, 

And  such  a smith  we’ll  never  find. 

Too  dear  for  his  offence  pay  we 
If  there’s  no  way  to  get  him  free.” 

“ Remember,  friend,  the  good  book  says : 

* Life  for  life.’” 

“ Ay,  sire,  always. 

But  we’ve  a poor,  old  baker  now 
Who’s  doomed  to  die  soon  anyhow. 

There’s  two  of  them — so  one  to  spare. 

Take  him  ; thus  life  for  life  is  had.” 

“ Well,  well ! ” did  the  sage  judge  declare  s 
“That  last  suggestion  isn’t  bad. 

I will  postpone  the  case  ; in  such 
Grave  matters  one  must  ponder  much. 

Oh,  that  our  blacksmith  I could  free  1 
Farewell  1 What  can  be  done,  I’ll  see.” 


“Fkrewell.  your  Honor! 


J OH  A N HERMANN  WESSEL 


I 


Assiduously 

Through  all  the  statutes  searches  he 
And  finds  there  nothing  to  dispute 
A judge’s  power  to  substitute 
The  baker  for  the  blacksmith  ; so 
His  judgment  on  that  fact  he  grounded. 
And  thus  this  sentence  wise  propounded : 
(Attend  all  ye  who  wish  to  know!) 

“ Here,  blacksmith  Jens,  before  the  bar 
The  murderer  who  to  his  rest 
Sent  Anders  Pedersen,  you  are, 

Without  excuse,  and  self-confessed. 

But  we  of  blacksmiths  have  but  one, 

And  I would  be  out  of  my  head 
To  want  to  see  that  blacksmith  hung 
While  there  are  two  men  baking  bread. 
Therefore  do  I pronounce  this  sentence : 
The  oldest  baker  shall  be  sent  hence  ; 

His  life  shall  forfeit  to  expiate 
The  wrongful  taking  of  another’% 

As  well-deserving  of  that  fate 
And  as  a warning  unto  others.’* 

The  baker  wept  most  grievously 
That  he  must  hang  vicariously. 

Moral. 

Be  ye  ever  prepared  to  die  ; 

Death  comes  when  least  you  think  him  nigh 


WEYMAN,  Stanley  J.,  an  English  novelist, 
born  at  Ludlow,  Shropshire, in  1855.  He  was  edu- 
cated at  Shrewsbury  and  Christ  Church,  Oxford. 
In  1878  he  was  classical  instructor  in  the  King’s 
School,  Chester,  read  law,  and  was  admitted  to  the 
bar  in  1881,  and  practised  until  1890.  His  first  writ- 
ings appeared  in  the  Cornhill  Magazine  in  1883. 
Among  his  principal  works  are  : The  House  of  the 
Wolf  { 1890) ; Francis  Cludde  (1891) ; The  New  Rector 
(1891);  A Gentleman  of  France  (1893)  ; Under  the 
Red  Robe  (1894) ; My  Lady  Rotha  (1894) ; The  Red 
Cockade  (1895) ; From  the  Memoirs  of  a Minister  of 
France  (1895). 

“ Mr.  Stanley  Wey  man’s  stories  are  greedily  and 
unthinkingly  devoured,”  says  the  Bookman,  “Any 
reader  who  stops  to  think  must  respect  them. 
There  is  an  evenness  about  the  workmanship 
which  can  only  be  the  result  of  great  care.  And 
though  the  average  English  sentiment  on  histori- 
cal matters  is  generally  reflected — which  adds,  of 
course,  to  their  chance  of  popularity — the  charac- 
ters are  never  the  puppets  that  the  conventional 
adventure-story  is  content  with.  Mr.  Wcy.^nan 
does  not  write  of  another  age  than  his  own  to 
shelter  his  ignorance  of  human  nature  among  the 
imposing  circumstances  of  famous  events.  There 
is  a group  of  characters  here  \The  Red  Cockade ] 

that  not  only  look  well  when  soen  in  motion  in  1 

(198) 


STANLEY  WEYMAN. 


Hit  uisit*«r 
OF  THE 


STANLEY  /.  WEYMAN 


199 


crowd,  but  arc  real  and  living,  no  matter  how 
closely  you  examine  them.  The  hero  is  no  great 
hero,  though  he  is  brave  enough.  Circumstances 
are  unkind ; and  at  different  times,  and  always  for 
good  reasons,  he  dons  the  white,  the  tricolor,  and 
the  red  cockades.  But  that  he  is  driven  to  deal- 
ing with  so  many  factions  makes  him,  perhaps,  all 
the  better  as  the  central  personage  of  the  story.” 

THE  ROAD  TO  PARIS. 

I remember  hearing  Marshal  Bassompierre,  who,  of 
all  men  within  my  knowledge,  had  the  widest  experi- 
ence, say  that  not  dangers,  but  discomforts,  prove  a 
man,  and  show  what  he  is  ; and  that  the  worst  sores  in 
life  are  caused  by  crumpled  rose-leaves  and  not  by 
thorns. 

I am  inclined  to  agree  with  this.  Fori  remember  that 
when  I came  from  my  room  on  the  morning  after  the 
arrest,  and  found  hall  and  parlor  and  passage  empty, 
and  all  the  common  rooms  of  the  house  deserted,  and 
no  meal  laid,  and  when  I divined  anew  from  this  dis- 
covery the  feeling  of  the  house  toward  me — however 
natural  and  to  be  expected — I felt  as  sharp  a pang  as 
when,  the  night  before,  I had  had  to  face  discovery  and 
open  rage  and  scorn.  I stood  in  the  silent,  empty  par- 
lor, and  looked  round  me  with  a sense  of  desolation  ; 
of  something  lost  and  gone,  which  I could  not  replace. 
The  morning  was  gray  and  cloudy,  the  air  sharp  ; a 
shower  was  falling.  The  rose-bushes  at  the  window 
swayed  in  the  wind,  and  where  I could  remember  the 
hot  sunshine  lying  on  the  floor  and  table,  the  rain  beat 
in  and  stained  the  boards.  The  main  door  flapped  and 
creaked  to  and  fro.  I thought  of  other  days,  and  meals 
I had  taken  there,  and  of  the  scent  of  flowers,  and  I 
fled  to  the  hall  in  despair. 

But  here,  too,  was  no  sign  of  life  or  company,  no 
comfort,  no  attendance.  The  ashes  of  the  logs,  by 
whose  blaze  Mademoiselle  had  told  me  the  secret,  lay 
on  the  hearth  white  and  cold  ; and  now  and  then  a drop 


ano 


STANLEY  J.  WEYMAN 


of  moisture,  sliding  down  the  great  chimney,  pattered 
among  them.  The  great  door  stood  open  as  if  the 
house  had  no  longer  anything  to  guard.  The  only  liv- 
ing thing  to  be  seen  was  a hound  which  roamed  about 
restlessly,  now  gazing  at  the  empty  hearth,  now  lying 
down  with  pricked  ears  and  watchful  eyes.  Some 
leaves  which  had  been  blown  in  rustled  in  a corner. 

I went  out  moodily  into  the  garden,  and  wandered 
down  one  path,  and  up  another,  looking  at  the  dripping 
woods  and  remembering  things,  until  I came  to  the  stone 
seat.  On  it,  against  the  wall,  trickling  with  rain-drops, 
and  with  a dead  leaf  half  filling  its  narrow  neck,  stood 
a pitcher  of  food.  I though  how  much  had  happened 
since  Mademoiselle  took  her  hand  off  it  and  the  ser- 
geant’s lanthorn  disclosed  it  to  me.  And  sighing 
grimly,  I went  in  again  through  the  parlor  door. 

A woman  was  on  her  knees,  kindling  the  belated  fire. 
I stood  a moment,  looking  at  her  doubtfully,  wondering 
how  she  would  bear  herself,  and  what  she  would  say  to 
me  ; and  then  she  turned  and  I cried  out  her  name  in 
horror,  for  it  was  Madame. — Under  the  Red  Robe. 


WHATELY,  Richard,  an  English  prelate  and 
theologian,  Archbishop  of  Dublin,  born  in  Lon- 
don, February  i,  1787  ; died  in  Dublin,  October  8, 
1863.  He  finished  his  studies  at  Oxford,  and  had 
a fellowship  there,  after  which  he  was  rector  of 
Halesworth  in  Suffolk,  principal  of  St.  Albans 
Hall,  Oxford,  and,  in  1830,  professor  of  political 
economy.  In  1831  he  became  Archbishop  of 
Dublin.  He  did  much  to  forward  the  cause  of 
general  education,  and  to  promote  liberal  views  in 
the  English  Church.  Among  his  numerous  works 
are  : Historic  Doubts  Relative  to  Napoleon  Bona- 
parte (1819),  a burlesque  aimed  at  the  “ destructive 
school”  of  criticism  ; Essays  on  the  Peculiarities  of 
the  Christian  Religion  (1825) ; Elements  of  Logic 
(1826);  Elements  of  Rhetoric  (1828);  Difficulties  in 
the  Writings  of  St.  Paul  (1828);  Political  Economy 
(1831);  Introduction  to  the  Study  of  St.  Paul's 
Epistles  (1849) ; English  Synonyms  (1851)  ; Scripture 
Doctrine  Concerning  the  Sacraments  (1857)  ; Lessons 
on  Mind  (1859) ; Lessons  on  the  British  Constitution 
(1859);  Lectures  on  the  Parables  (i860) ; Lectures  on 
Prayer  (i860);  Rise,  Progress , and  Corruption  of 
Christianity  (i860) ; Miscellaneous  Lectures  and  Re- 
views (1861)  ; Remains  (1864). 

“ Among  the  English  prelates  with  whom  I be- 
came acquainted,”  says  Guizot,  the  French  his- 
torian, “ the  Archbishop  of  Dublin,  Dr.  Whately, 

(aoi) 


202 


RICHARD  WHATELY 


a correspondent  of  our  Institute,  both  interested 
and  surprised  me.  His  mind  appeared  to  me 
original  and  well  cultivated  ; startling  and  ingen- 
ious, rather  than  profound,  in  philosophic  and 
social  science  ; a most  excellent  man  ; thorough- 
ly disinterested,  tolerant  and  liberal ; and  in  the 
midst  of  his  unwearying  activity  and  exhaustless 
flow  of  conversation,  strangely  absent,  familiar, 
confused,  eccentric,  amiable,  and  engaging,  no 
matter  what  impoliteness  he  might  commit  or 
what  propriety  he  might  forget.” 

“We  venture  to  express  our  conviction,”  says 
Henry  Rogers,  “ . . . that  though  this  lucid 

and  eloquent  writer  may,  for  obvious  reasons,  be 
most  widely  known  by  his  Logic  and  Rhetoric ; 
the  time  will  come  when  his  theological  works 
will  be,  if  not  more  widely  read,  still  more  highly 
prized.” 

“ Whately  had  a mind  of  great  logical  power, 
with  little  imagination  or  fancy,”  says  Professor 
Shaw.  “ His  clear,  unanswerable  arguments  pro- 
duce conviction  in  his  readers.  He  says  of  him- 
self that  he  was  personally  of  no  influence  among 
men  ; but  he  was  able  so  conclusively  to  exhibit 
his  processes  of  reasoning  and  arguments,  that 
he  produced  a great  impression  upon  the  circles 
which  they  affected.  His  views  of  questions  are 
often  shallow,  but  always  practical.  His  style  is 
luminous,  easy,  and  well  adorned  with  every-day 
illustrations.  A moralist  of  much  higher  tone 
than  Paley — which  fact  arose  from  the  general 
spirit  of  his  time — he  is  the  best  representative  of 
Paley  in  the  present  age.  He  is,  as  Paley  was, 


RICHARD  WHAT  ELY 


203 


clear  rather  than  profound,  vigorous  rather  than 
subtle;  with  little  speculation  he  unites  much 
practical  sense.” 

LEARNED  IGNORANCE. 

Though  Bacon  dwelt  on  the  importance  of  setting 
out  from  an  accurate  knowledge  of  facts,  and  on  the 
absurdity  of  attempting  to  substitute  the  reasoning 
process  for  an  investigation  of  nature,  it  would  be  a 
great  mistake  to  imagine  that  he  meant  to  disparage 
the  reasoning  process,  or  to  substitute  for  skill  and 
correctness  in  that  a mere  accumulated  knowledge  of 
a multitude  of  facts.  And  anyone  would  be  far  in- 
deed from  being  a follower  of  Bacon  who  should  de- 
spise logical  accuracy,  and  trust  to  what  is  often  called 
experience  ; meaning  by  that  an  extensive  but  crude 
and  undigested  observation.  For,  as  books,  though 
indispensably  necessary  for  a student,  are  of  no  use  to 
one  who  has  not  learned  to  read,  though  he  distinctly 
sees  black  marks  on  white  paper,  so  is  all  experience 
and  acquaintance  with  facts  unprofitable  to  one  whose 
mind  has  not  been  trained  to  read  rightly  the  volume 
of  nature  and  of  human  transactions  spread  before  him. 

When  complaints  are  made — often  not  altogether 
without  reason — of  the  prevailing  ignorance  of  facts 
on  such  and  such  subjects,  it  will  often  be  found  that 
the  parties  censured,  though  possessing  less  knowledge 
than  is  desirable,  yet  possess  more  than  they  know 
what  to  do  with.  Their  deficiency  in  arranging  and 
applying  their  knowledge,  in  combining  facts,  and  cor- 
rectly deducing,  and  rightly  employing,  general  princi- 
ples, will  be  perhaps  greater  than  their  ignorance  of 
facts.  Now,  to  attempt  remedying  this  defect  by  im- 
parting to  them  additional  knowledge — to  confer  the 
advantage  of  wider  experience  on  those  who  have  not 
skill  in  profiting  by  experience — is  to  attempt  enlarging 
the  prospect  of  a short-sighted  man  by  bringing  him  to 
the  top  of  a hill.  Since  he  could  not,  on  the  plain,  see 
distinctly  the  objects  before  him,  the  wider  horizon  from 
the  hill-top  is  utterly  lost  on  him.  ...  If  Bacon 
had  lived  in  the  present  day,  I am  convinced  he  would 


RICHARD  WHA  TILL  Y 


a«4 

have  made  his  chief  complaint  against  unmethodized 
inquiry  and  careless  and  illogical  reasoning. — Lecture 
on  Bacons  Essays . 

ORIGIN  OF  CIVILIZATION. 

You  may  hear  plausible  descriptions  given  of  a sup- 
posed race  of  savages  subsisting  on  wild  fruits,  herbs, 
and  roots,  and  on  the  precarious  supplies  of  hunting 
and  fishing  ; and  then,  of  the  supposed  process  by  which 
they  emerged  from  this  state,  and  gradually  invented 
the  various  arts  of  life,  till  they  became  a decidedly 
civilized  people.  One  man,  it  has  been  supposed,  wish- 
ing to  save  himself  the  trouble  of  roaming  through  the 
woods  in  search  of  wild  fruits  and  roots,  would  bethink 
himself  of  collecting  the  seeds  of  these,  and  cultivating 
them  in  a plot  of  ground  cleared  and  broken  up  for  the 
purpose.  And  finding  that  he  could  thus  raise  more 
than  enough  for  himself,  he  might  agree  with  some  of 
his  neighbors  to  exchange  a part  of  his  produce  for 
some  of  the  game  or  fish  taken  by  them.  Another  man 
again,  it  has  been  supposed,  would  contrive  to  save  him- 
self the  labor  and  uncertainty  of  hunting,  by  catching 
some  kinds  of  wild  animals  alive,  and  keeping  them  in 
an  enclosure  to  breed,  that  he  might  have  a supply  al- 
ways at  hand.  And  again  others,  it  is  supposed,  might 
devote  themselves  to  the  occupation  of  dressing  skins 
for  clothing,  or  of  building  huts  or  canoes,  or  of  mak- 
ing bows  and  arrows,  or  various  kinds  of  tools ; each 
exchanging  his  productions  with  his  neighbors  for  food. 
And  each,  by  devoting  his  attention  to  some  one  kind 
of  manufacture,  would  acquire  increased  skill  in  that, 
and  strike  out  new  inventions.  . . . 

Such  descriptions  as  the  above,  of  what  it  is  supposed 
has  actually  taken  place,  or  of  what  possibly  might  take 
place,  are  likely  to  appear  plausible,  at  the  first  glance, 
to  those  who  do  not  inquire  carefully  and  reflect  at- 
tentively. But,  on  examination,  all  these  suppositions 
will  be  found  to  be  completely  at  variance  with  all  his- 
tory, and  inconsistent  with  the  character  of  such  beings 
as  real  savages  actually  are.  Such  a process  of  inven- 
tions and  improvements  as  that  just  described  is  what 


RICHARD  WHAT  ELY 


205 


we  may  safely  say  never  did,  and  never  possibly  can, 
take  place  in  any  tribe  of  savages  left  wholly  to  them- 
selves. 

As  for  the  ancient  Germans,  and  the  Britons  and 
Gauls,  all  of  whom  we  have  pretty  full  accounts  of  in 
the  works  of  Caesar  and  Tacitus,  they  did  indeed  fall 
considerably  short,  in  civilization,  of  the  Greeks  and 
Romans,  who  were  accustomed  to  comprehend  under 
one  sweeping  term  of  “ barbarians  ” all  nations  but 
themselves.  But  it  would  be  absurd  to  reckon  as 
savages  nations  which,  according  to  the  authors  just 
mentioned,  cultivated  their  land,  kept  cattle,  employed 
horses  in  their  wars,  and  made  use  of  metals  for  their 
weapons  and  other  instruments.  A people  so  far  ad- 
vanced as  that  would  not  be  unlikely,  under  favorable 
circumstances,  to  advance  further  still,  and  to  attain, 
step  by  step,  to  a high  degree  of  civilization. 

But  as  for  savages,  properly  so  styled — that  is,  people 
sunk  as  low,  or  anything  near  as  low,  as  many  tribes 
that  our  voyagers  have  made  us  acquainted  with — there 
is  no  one  instance  recorded  of  any  of  them  rising  into 
a civilized  condition,  or  indeed,  rising,  at  all,  without 
instruction  and  assistance  from  a people  already  civil- 
ized. We  have  numerous  accounts  of  various  savage 
tribes,  in  different  parts  of  the  globe — in  hot  countries 
and  in  cold,  in  fertile  and  in  barren,  in  maritime  and 
in  inland  situations — who  have  been  visited  from  time 
to  time,  at  considerable  intervals,  by  navigators,  but 
have  had  no  settled  intercourse  with  civilized  people  ; 
and  all  of  them  appear  to  have  continued,  from  age  to 
age,  in  the  same  rude  condition.  Of  the  savages  of 
Tierra  del  Fuego,  for  instance,  it  is  remarked  by  Mr. 
Darwin,  the  naturalist  (who  was  in  the  “ Beagle  ” on  its 
second  voyage  of  discovery)  that  they,  “ in  one  re- 
spect, resemble  the  brute  animals,  inasmuch  as  they 
make  no  improvements.”  As  birds,  for  instance,  which 
have  an  instinct  for  building  nests,  build  them,  each 
species,  just  as  at  first,  after  countless  generations  ; so 
it  is,  says  he,  with  this  people.  “ Their  canoe,  which  is 
their  most  skilful  work  of  art — and  a wretched  canoe 
it  is — is  exactly  the  same  as  it  was  two  hundred  and 
fifty  years  ago.”  The  New  Zealanders,  again,  whom 


206 


RICHARD  WHATELY 


Tasman  first  discovered  in  1642,  and  who  were  visited 
for  the  second  time  by  Cook  one  hundred  and  twenty- 
seven  years  after,  were  found  by  him  exactly  in  the 
same  condition.  And  yet  these  last  were  very  far  from 
being  in  as  low  a state  as  the  New  Hollanders  ; for 
they  cultivated  the  ground,  raising  crops  of  the  Cumera 
(or  sweet  potato),  and  clothed  themselves,  not  with 
skins,  but  with  mats  w^oven  by  themselves.  . . . 

Then,  again,  if  we  look  at  ancient  historical  records  and 
traditions  concerning  nations  that  are  reported  to  have 
risen  from  a savage  to  a civilized  state,  wre  find  that  in 
every  instance  they  appear  to  have  had  the  advantage 
of  the  instruction  and  example  of  civilized  men  living 
among  them.  They  always  have  some  tradition  of 
some  foreigner,  or  some  Being  from  heaven,  as  having 
first  taught  them  the  arts  of  life.  . . . But  there  is 

no  need  to  inquire,  even  if  we  could  do  so  with  any 
hope  of  success,  what  mixture  there  may  be  of  truth  and 
fable  in  any  of  these  traditions.  For  our  present  pur- 
pose  it  is  enough  to  have  pointed  out  that  they  all  agree 
in  one  thing,  in  representing  civilization  as  having  been 
introduced  (whenever  it  has  been  introduced)  not  from 
within , but  from  without.  . . . 

When  you  try  to  fancy  yourself  in  the  situation  of  a 
savage,  it  may  perhaps  occur  to  you  that  you  w’ould  set 
your  mind  to  work  to  contrive  means  for  bettering  your 
condition,  and  that  you  might  hit  upon  such  and  such 
useful  and  very  obvious  contrivances  ; and  hence  you 
may  be  led  to  think  it  natural  that  savages  should  do 
so,  and  that  some  tribes  of  them  may  have  advanced 
themselves  in  the  w7ay  above  described,  without  any 
external  help.  But  what  leads  some  persons  to  fancy 
this  possible  (though  it  appears  to  have  never  realty 
occurred)  is,  that  they  themselves  are  not  savages,  but 
have  some  degree  of  mental  cultivation,  and  some  of 
the  habits  of  thought  of  civilized  men.  And  they  im- 
agine themselves  merely  destitute  of  the  knowledge  of 
some  things  w^hich  they  actually  know  ; but  they  can- 
not succeed  in  divesting  themselves,  in  imagination,  of 
the  civilized  character . And  hence  they  form  to  them- 
selves an  incorrect  notion  of  what  a savage  realty  is. — 
Lecture  on  the  Origin  of  Civilization. 


RICHARD  WHATELV 


207 


CIVILIZATION  FAVORAELE  TO  MORALITY. 

On  the  whole,  then,  there  seems  every  reason  to  be- 
lieve, that,  as  a general  rule,  that  advancement  in  na- 
tional prosperity  which  mankind  are,  by  the  Governor 
of  the  universe  adapted,  and  impelled  to  promote,  must 
be  favorable  to  moral  improvement.  Still  more  does  it 
appear  evident,  that  such  a conclusion  must  be  acceptable 
to  a pious  and  philanthropic  mind.  It  is  not  probable, 
still  less  is  it  desirable,  that  the  Deity  should  have  fitted 
and  destined  society  to  make  a continual  progress,  im- 
peded only  by  slothful  and  negligent  habits,  by  war, 
rapine,  and  oppression  (in  short,  by  violation  of  divine 
commands),  which  progress  inevitably  tends  toward  a 
greater  and  greater  moral  corruption. 

And  yet  there  are  some  who  appear  not  only  to  think, 
but  to  wish  to  think,  that  a condition  but  little  removed 
from  the  savage  state— one  of  ignorance,  grossness,  and 
poverty— unenlightened,  semi  - barbarous,  and  station- 
ary, is  the  most  favorable  to  virtue.  You  will  meet  with 
persons  who  will  be  even  offended  if  you  attempt  to 
awaken  them  from  their  dreams  about  primitive  rural 
simplicity,  and  to  convince  them  that  the  spread  of  civ- 
ilization, which  they  must  see  has  a tendency  to  spread, 
does  not  tend  to  increase  depravity.  Supposing  their 
notion  true,  it  must  at  least,  one  would  think,  be  a mel- 
ancholy truth. 

It  may  be  said  as  a reason,  not  for  wishing,  but  for 
believing  this,  that  the  moral  dangers  which  beset  a 
wealthy  community  are  designed  as  a trial.  Undoubt- 
edly they  are,  since  no  state  in  which  man  is  placed  is 
exempt  from  trials.  And  let  it  be  admitted,  also,  if  you 
will,  that  the  temptations  to  evil  to  which  civilized 
man  is  exposed  are  absolutely  stronger  than  those  which 
exist  in  a ruder  state  of  society  : still,  if  they  are  also 
relatively  stronger— stronger  in  proportion  to  the  coun- 
teracting forces,  and  stronger  than  the  augmented  mo- 
tives to  good  conduct— and  are  such,  consequently, 
that,  as  society  advances  in  civilization,  there  is  less  and 
less  virtue,  and  a continually  decreasing  prospect  of  its 
being  attained— -this  amounts  to  something  more  than 


20$ 


RICHARD  WHATELY 


a state  of  trial ; it  is  a distinct  provision  made  b/  the 
Deity  for  the  moral  degradation  of  His  rational  creat- 
ures. 

This  can  hardly  be  a desirable  conclusion  ; but  if  it 
be,  nevertheless,  a true  one  (and  our  wishes  should  not 
be  allowed  to  bias  our  judgment),  those  who  hold  it, 
ought  at  least  to  follow  it  up  in  practice,  by  diminish- 
ing, as  far  as  is  possible,  the  severity  of  the  trial.  . . . 
Let  us  put  away  from  us  “ the  accursed  thing.”  If  na- 
tional wealth  be,  in  a moral  point  of  view,  an  evil,  let 
us,  in  the  name  of  all  that  is  good,  set  about  to  diminish 
it.  Let  us,  as  he  advises,  burn  our  fleets,  block  up  our 
ports,  destroy  our  manufactories,  break  up  our  roade, 
and  betake  ourselves  to  a life  of  frugal  and  rustic  sim> 
plicity  ; like  Mandeville’s  bees,  who 

“ flew  into  a hollow  tree. 

Blest  with  content  and  honesty.” 


WHEWELL,  William,  an  English  scientist 
and  philosopher,  born  at  Lancaster,  May  24,  1794; 
died  at  Cambridge,  March  6,  1866.  Of  humble 
parentage,  he  was  educated  at  Heversham  School 
and  at  Trinity,  Cambridge.  From  1828  to  1832 
he  was  Professor  of  Mineralogy,  from  1838  to 
1S55  of  Moral  Theology,  and  from  1841  to  his 
death  he  was  Master  of  Trinity  College.  In  the 
learned  societies  of  Great  Britain  he  was  active 
and  distinguished ; his  wonderful  variety  and 
amount  of  knowledge  were  spoken  of  by  Sir  John 
Herschel  as  unsurpassed.  His  great  works  were 
A History  of  the  Inductive  Sciences  (1837),  and  the 
Philosophy  of  the  same  (1840);  other  works  were 
the  Bridgewater  Treatise  on  Astronomy  and  Gen- 
eral Physics  (1833);  Architectural  Notes  on  German 
Churches  (1835);  Principles  of  English  University 
Education  (1837);  Liberal  Education  (3  parts,  1845- 
52);  The  Plurality  of  Worlds  (1853);  Elements  of 
Morality  (1845);  Systematic  Morality  (1846);  His- 
tory of  Moral  Philosophy  in  England  (1852);  Platonic 
Dialogues  (185 9-6 1 ) ; Political  Economy  (1863),  trans- 
lations from  German  verse,  and  English  hexam- 
eters (1847),  besides  numerous  scientific  papers, 
sermons,  etc.  A volume  of  his  correspondence 
was  printed  in  1876. 

THE  BEAUTY  OP  NATURE. 

The  copiousness  with  which  properties,  as  to  us  it 
sterns,  merely  ornamental,  are  diffused  through  t h# 


210 


WILLIAM  WH EWELL 


creation,  may  well  excite  our  wonder.  Almost  all  have 
felt,  as  it  were,  a perplexity,  chastened  by  the  sense  of 
beauty,  when  they  have  thought  of  the  myriads  of  fair 
and  gorgeous  objects  that  exist  and  perish  without  any 
eye  to  witness  their  glories — the  flowers  that  are  born 
to  blush  unseen  in  the  wilderness — the  gems,  so  won- 
drously  fashioned,  that  stud  the  untrodden  caverns — 
the  living  things  with  adornments  of  yet  richer  work- 
manship that,  solitary  and  unknown,  glitter  and  die. 
Nor  is  science  without  food  for  such  feelings.  At  every 
step  she  discloses  things  and  laws  pregnant  with  unob- 
trusive splendor.  She  has  unravelled  the  web  of  light 
in  which  all  things  are  involved,  and  has  found  its  text- 
ure even  more  wonderful  and  exquisite  than  she  could 
have  thought.  This  she  has  done  in  our  own  days — 
and  these  admirable  properties  the  sunbeams  had  borne 
about  with  them  since  light  was  created,  contented,  as  it 
were,  with  their  unseen  glories.  What,  then,  shall  we 
say  ? These  forms,  these  appearances  of  pervading 
beauty,  though  we  know  not  their  end  and  meaning, 
still  touch  all  thoughtful  minds  with  a sense  of  hidden 
delight,  a still  and  grateful  admiration.  They  come 
over  our  meditations  like  strains  and  snatches  of  a 
sweet  and  distant  symphony — sweet,  indeed,  but  to  us 
distant  and  broken,  and  overpowered  by  the  din  of 
more  earthly  perceptions — taught  but  at  intervals — 
eluding  our  attempts  to  learn  it  as  a whole,  but  ever  and 
anon  returning  on  our  ears,  and  elevating  our  thoughts 
of  the  fabric  of  this  world.  We  might;  indeed,  well  be- 
lieve that  this  harmony  breathes  not  for  us  alone — that 
it  has  nearer  listeners — more  delighted  auditors.  But 
even  in  us  it  raises  no  unworthy  thoughts — even  in  us 
it  impresses  a conviction,  indestructible  by  harsher 
voices,  that,  far  beyond  all  that  we  can  know  and  con- 
ceive, the  universe  is  full  of  symmetry  and  order  and 
beauty  and  life. 

FACT  AND  THEORY. 

The  distinction  between  Theory  (that  is,  true  Theory) 
and  Fact,  is  this  : that  in  Theory  the  Ideas  are  con- 
sidered as  distinct  from  the  Facts  ; in  Facts,  though, 
Ideas  may  be  involved,  they  are  not,  in  our  apprehen- 


WILLIAM  WH EWELL 


211 


sion,  separated  from  the  sensations.  In  a fact,  the 
ideas  are  applied  so  readily  and  familiarly,  and  incorpo- 
rated with  the  sensations  so  entirely,  that  we  do  not 
see  them , we  see  through  them.  ...  A person  who, 
knowing  the  Fact  of  the  earth’s  annual  motion,  refers 
it  distinctly  to  its  mechanical  cause,  conceives  the  sun’s 
attraction  as  a Fact,  just  as  he  conceives  as  a Fact  the 
action  of  the  wind  which  turns  the  sails  of  a mill.  He 
cannot  see  the  force  in  either  case  ; he  supplies  it  out 
of  his  own  ideas.  And  thus,  a true  Theory  is  a Fact ; 
a Fact  is  a familiar  Theory.  That  which  is  a Fact  un- 
der one  aspect  is  a Theory  under  another.  The  more 
recondite  Theories  when  firmly  established  are  Facts ; 
the  simplest  Facts  involve  something  of  the  nature  of 
a Theory.  Theory  and  Fact  correspond,  in  a certain  de- 
gree, with  ideas  and  sensations,  as  to  the  nature  of  their 
opposition.  But  the  Facts  are  Facts  so  far  as  the  Ideas 
have  been  combined  with  the  Sensations  and  absorbed 
in  them  ; the  Theories  are  Theories  so  far  as  the  Ideas 
are  kept  distinct  from  the  Sensations,  and  so  far  as  it 
is  considered  still  a question  whether  those  can  be  made 
to  agree  with  these.  . . . 

Even  in  the  case  in  which  our  perceptions  appear  to 
be  most  direct,  and  least  to  involve  any  interpretations 
of  our  own — in  the  simple  process  of  seeing — who  does 
not  know  how  much  we,  by  an  act  of  the  mind,  add  to 
that  which  our  senses  received  ? Does  anyone  fancy 
that  he  sees  a solid  cube  ? It  is  easy  to  show  that 
the  solidity  of  the  figure,  the  relative  position  of  its 
faces  and  edges  to  each  other,  are  inferences  of  the 
spectator,  no  more  conveyed  to  his  conviction  by  the 
eye  alone  than  they  would  be  if  he  were  looking  at  a 
painted  representation  of  a cube.  The  scene  of  nature 
is  a picture  without  depth  of  substance,  no  less  than 
the  scene  of  art  ; and  in  the  one  case  as  in  the  other,  it 
is  the  mind  which,  by  an  act  of  its  own,  discovers  that 
color  and  shape  denote  distance  and  solidity.  Most 
men  are  unconscious  of  this  perpetual  habit  of  reading 
the  language  of  the  external  world,  and  translating  as 
they  read.  The  draughtsman,  indeed,  is  compelled, 
for  his  purposes,  to  return  back  in  thought  from  the 
solid  bodies  which  he  has  inferred,  to  the  shapes  of  the 
Vol.  XXIV.— 14 


2T2 


WILLIAM  WH EWELL 


surface  which  he  really  sees.  He  knows  that  there  is  a 
mask  of  theory  over  the  whole  face  of  nature,  if  it  be  a 
theory  to  infer  more  than  we  see.  But  other  men,  un- 
aware of  this  masquerade,  hold  it  to  be  a fact  that  they 
see  cubes  and  spheres,  spacious  apartments  and  wind- 
ing avenues.  And  these  things  are  facts  to  them,  be- 
cause they  are  unconscious  of  the  mental  operation  by 
which  they  have  penetrated  nature’s  disguise. 

And  thus  we  have  an  intelligible  distinction  of  Fact 
and  Theory,  if  we  consider  Theory  as  a conscious,  and 
Fact  as  an  unconscious,  inference,  from  the  phenomena 
which  are  presented  to  our  senses.  . . . 

The  terms  of  this  antithesis  are  often  used  in  a vehe- 
ment and  peremptory  manner.  Thus  we  are  often  toid 
that  such  a thing  is  a Fact ; A Fact  and  not  a Theory, 
with  all  the  emphasis  which,  in  speaking  or  writing, 
tone,  or  italics  or  capitals  can  give.  We  see,  from  what 
has  been  said,  that  when  this  is  urged,  before  we  can 
estimate  the  truth,  or  the  value  of  the  assertion,  we 
must  ask  to  whom  is  it  a Fact  ? what  habits  of  thought, 
what  previous  information,  what  Ideas  does  it  imply,  to 
conceive  the  Fact  as  a Fact  ? Does  not  the  apprehen- 
sion of  the  Fact  imply  assumptions  which  may  with 
equal  justice  be  called  Theory,  and  which  are,  perhaps, 
false  Theory  ? — in  which  case,  the  Fact  is  no  Fact. — 
History  of  Scientific  Ideas . 


WHIPPLE,  Edwin  Percy,  an  American  critic 
and  essayist,  born  at  Gloucester,  Mass.,  March  8, 
1819;  died  in  Boston,  June  16,  1886.  He  was  ed- 
ucated in  the  High  School  of  Salem,  and  began 
to  write  for  newspapers  at  the  age  of  fourteen. 
From  his  fifteenth  year  he  lived  in  Boston,  and 
at  times  was  editorially  connected  with  the  Globe 
and  the  Transcript.  His  masterly  critique  on 
Macaulay  made  him  known,  and  he  soon  entered 
on  his  career  as  a prominent  lecturer  throughout 
the  United  States.  His  published  volumes  are: 
Essays  and  Reviezvs  (2  vols.,  1848-49)  ; Literature 
and  Life  (1849)  5 Character  and  Characteristic  Men 
(1866) ; Success  and  its  Conditions  ( 1 870) ; Literature 
of  the  Age  of  Elizabeth  (1876),  and,  published  after 
his  death,  Recollections  of  Eminent  Men  (1887); 
American  Literature , and  Other  Papers  (1 887)  ; Out* 
looks  on  Society , Literature , and  Politics  (1888). 

The  following  extract  is  from  a severe  review 
that  enforces  prime  truths  and  exhibits  the  au- 
thor’s power  of  expression,  but  overlooks  the  value 
of  Roget’s  Thesaurus  of  English  Words , first  in 
reminding  one  of  a word  felt  in  the  memory,  but 
not  at  the  moment  recalled,  and  secondly,  in  re- 
minding one  of  synonyms  that  may  be  used  when 
there  is  a tendency  to  the  repetition  of  a word—' 
uses  that  render  the  book  a very  desirable  addi- 
tion to  handy  velum  es  for  occasional  reference. 

1213) 


214 


EDWIN  PERCY  WHIPPLE 


MISUSE  OF  WORDS. 

It  is  supposed  that  the  development  and  the  disci- 
pline of  thought  are  to  be  conducted  apart  from  the  de- 
velopment and  discipline  of  the  power  of  expressing 
thought.  Fill  your  head  with  words,  and  when  you  get 
an  idea  fit  it  to  them — this  is  the  current  mode,  pro- 
lific in  famished  intellects  and  starveling  expressions. 
Hence  the  prevailing  lack  of  intellectual  conscientious- 
ness, or  closeness  of  expression  to  the  thing — a palpa- 
ble interval  between  them  being  revealed  at  the  first 
probe  of  analysis.  Words  and  things  having  thus  no 
vital  principle  of  union,  being,  in  fact,  attached  or 
tied  together,  they  can  be  easily  detached  or  unbound, 
and  the  expression  accordingly  bears  but  the  similitude 
of  life. 

But  it  is  honorable  to  human  nature  that  men  hate 
to  write  unless  inspired  to  write.  As  soon  as  rhetoric 
become  a mechanical  exercise  it  becomes  a joyless 
drudgery,  and  drudgery  ends  in  a mental  disgust  which 
impairs  even  the  power  to  drudge.  There  is  conse- 
quently a continual  tendency  to  rebel  against  common- 
place, even  among  those  engaged  in  its  service.  But 
the  passage  from  this  intellectual  apathy  to  intellectual 
character  commonly  lies  through  intellectual  anarchy. 
The  literature  of  facts  connected  by  truisms,  and  the 
literature  of  things  connected  by  principles,  are  divided 
by  a wide,  chaotic  domain,  appropriated  to  the  litera- 
ture of  desperation  ; and  generally  the  first  token  that 
a writer  has  become  disgusted  with  the  truisms  of  the 
understanding  is  his  ostentatious  parade  of  the  para- 
doxes of  sensibility.  He  begins  to  rave  the  moment  he 
ceases  to  repeat. 

Now  the  vital  processes  of  thought  and  expression 
are  processes  of  no  single  faculty  or  impulse,  but  of  a 
whole  nature,  and  mere  sensibility,  or  mere  understand- 
ing, or  mere  imagination,  or  mere  will,  can  never  of 
itself  produce  the  effects  of  that  collected,  concen- 
trated, personal  power,  in  which  will,  intellect,  and 
sensibility  are  all  consolidated  in  one  individuality. 
The  utmost  strain  and  stir  of  the  impulses  can  but 


EDWIN  PERCY  WHIPPLE 


2i5 


mimic  strength,  when  they  are  disconnected  from  char- 
acter. Passion,  in  the  minds  of  the  anarchists  of  let- 
ters, instead  of  being  poured  through  the  intellect  to 
stimulate  intelligence  into  power,  frets  and  foams  into 
mere  passionateness.  It  does  not  condense  the  faculty 
in  which  it  inheres,  but  diffuses  the  faculty  to  which  it 
coheres.  It  makes  especial  claim  to  force;  but  the 
force  of  simple  sensibility  is  a pretentious  force,  evinc- 
ing no  general  might  of  nature,  no  innate,  original,  self-  ' 
centred  energy.  It  blusters  furiously  about  its  per- 
sonal vigor,  and  lays  a bullying  emphasis  on  the  “ me,” 
but  its  self-assertion  is  without  self-poise  or  self-might. 
The  grand  object  of  its  tempestuous  conceit  is  to  make 
a little  nature,  split  into  fragmentary  faculties  and  im- 
pulses, look  like  a great  nature,  stirred  by  strong  pas- 
sions, illumined  by  positive  ideas,  and  directed  to  defi- 
nite ends.  And  it  must  be  admitted  that,  so  far  as  the 
public  is  concerned,  it  often  succeeds  in  the  deception. 
Commonplace,  though  crazed  into  strange  shapes  by 
th®  delirium  tremens  of  sensibility,  and  uttering  itself  in 
strange  shrieks  and  screams,  is  essentially  common- 
place still,  but  it  often  passes  for  the  fine  frenzy  and  up- 
ward, rocket-like  rush  of  impassioned  imagination.  The 
writer,  therefore,  who  is  enabled,  by  a felicitous  de- 
formity of  nature,  to  indulge  in  it,  contrives  to  make 
many  sensible  people  guilty  of  the  blasphemy  of  calling 
him  a genius  ; if  he  have  the  knack  of  rhyming,  and 
can  set  to  music  his  agonies  of  weakness  and  ecstasies 
of  imbecility,  he  is  puffed  as  a great  poet,  superior  to 
all  the  restraints  of  artistic  law  ; and  he  is  allowed  to 
huddle  together  appetite  and  aspiration,  earth  and 
heaven,  man  and  God,  in  a truculent  fashion  peculiarly 
his  own.  Hence  such  “popular  ” poems  as  Mr.  Bailey’s 
Festus  and  Mr.  Robert  Montgomery’s  Satan, 

The  misuse  of  words  in  this  literature  of  ungoverned 
or  ungovernable  sensibility  has  become  so  general  as  to 
threaten  the  validity  of  all  definitions.  The  connection 
between  sign  and  thing  signified  has  been  so  severed 
that  it  resembles  the  logic  of  that  eminent  master  of 
argumentation  of  whom  it  was  said  “ that  his  premise? 
might  be  afflicted  with  the  confluent  small-pox  without 
his  conclusion  being  in  any  danger  of  catching  it.’* 

t 


216 


EDWIN  PERCY  WHIPPLE 


Objects  are  distorted,  relations  disturbed,  language  put 
upon  the  rack  to  torment  it  into  intensity,  and  the 
whole  composition  seems,  like  Tennyson’s  organ,  to  be 
“groaning  for  power,”  yet  the  result,  both  of  the  men- 
tal and  verbal  bombast,  is  simply  a feverish  feebleness, 
equally  effecting  thought  and  style.  Big  and  passion- 
ate as  are  the  words,  and  terrible  as  has  been  their  ex- 
ecution in  competent  hands,  they  resolutely  refuse  to 
do  the  work  of  dunces  and  maniacs.  1'he  spirits  are 
called,  but  they  decline  to  come. 

Yet  this  resounding  emptiness  of  diction  is  not  with- 
out popularity  and  influence,  though  its  popularity  has 
no  deep  roots,  and  its  influence  is  shaiiow.  Its  super- 
ficial effectiveness  is  indicated,  not  more  by  the  success 
of  the  passionate  men  who  fall  naturally  into  it,  than 
by  the  success  of  the  shrewd  men  who  coldly  imitate 
it.  Thus  Sheridan,  who  of  all  orators  had  the  least 
sensibility  and  the  most  wit  and  cunning,  adopted  in 
many  of  his  speeches  a style  as  bloated  as  his  owrn  face, 
full  of  fustian  deliberately  manufactured,  and  rant  be- 
traying the  most  painful  elaboration.  Our  own  legis- 
lative eloquence  is  singularly  rich  in  speeches  whose 
diction  is  a happy  compound  of  politic  wrath  and  flimsy 
fancies,  glowing  with  rage  worthy  of  Counsellor  Phil- 
lip’s philippics,  and  spangled  with  flowers  that  might 
have  been  gathered  in  the  garden  of  Mr.  Hervey’s 
Meditations.  But  we  should  do  great  injustice  to 
these  orators  if  we  supposed  them  as  foolish  as  they 
try  to  make  themselves  appear  in  their  eloquence ; and 
it  is  safe  to  impute  more  than  ordinary  reptile  sagacity, 
and  more  than  ordinary  skill  in  party  management,  to 
those  politicians  who  indulge  in  more  than  ordinary 
nonsense  in  their  declamations.  The  incapacity  to  feel 
which  their  bombast  evinces  proves  they  are  in  no  dan- 
ger of  being  whirled  into  imprudences  by  the  mad  emo- 
tions they  affect.  Such  oratory,  however,  has  a brassy 
taint  and  ring  inexpressibly  distasteful  both  to  the 
physical  and  intellectual  sense,  and  its  deliberate  hy- 
pocrisy of  feeling  is  a sure  sign  of  profligacy  of  mind. 

It  is  only,  however,  when  sensibility  is  genuine  and 
predominant  that  it  produces  that  anarchy  of  the  in- 
tellect in  which  the  literature  of  desperation?  as  con- 


EDWIN  PERCY  WHIPPLE 


217 


trasted  with  the  literature  of  inspiration,  has  its  source. 
The  chief  characteristic  of  this  literature  is  absence  of 
restraint.  Its  law  is  lawlessness.  It  is  developed  ac- 
cording  to  no  interior  principle  of  growth  ; it  adapts  it- 
self to  no  exterior  principle  of  art.  In  view  of  this,  it 
is  somewhat  singular  that  so  large  a portion  of  its  prod- 
ucts should  be  characterized  by  such  essential  medi- 
ocrity, since  it  might  be  supposed  that  an  ordinary  nat- 
ure, disordered  by  passion,  and  unrestrained  by  law, 
with  a brain  made  irritable,  if  not  sensitive,  by  internal 
rage,  would  exhibit  some  hysteric  burst  of  genius.  But 
a sharp  inspection  reveals,  in  a majority  of  cases,  that 
it  is  the  old  commonplace  galvanized.  Its  heat  is  not 
that  of  fire,  but  of  hot  water,  and  no  fusing-power  is 
perceptible  in  its  weltering  expanse.  . . . 

Even  in  those  writers  in  whom  this  sensibility  is  con- 
nected with  some  genius,  and  the  elements  of  whose 
minds  exhibit  marks  of  spontaneous  power,  we  are  con- 
tinually impressed  with  the  impotence  of  anarchy  to 
create,  or  combine,  or  portray.  They  never  present  the 
thing  itself  about  which  they  rave,  but  only  their  feel- 
ings about  the  thing.  They  project  into  nature  and 
life  the  same  confusion  of  objects  and  relations  which 
exists  in  their  own  minds,  and  stir  without  satisfying. 
That  misrepresentation  is  a mental  as  well  as  moral  of- 
fence, and  that  no  intellect  is  sound  unless  it  be  consci- 
entiously close  to  the  truth  of  things  in  perception  and 
expression,  are  maxims  which  they  scorn  to  allow  as 
checks  on  their  freedom  of  impulse.  But,  with  all  their 
bluster,  they  cannot  conceal  the  limitation  of  their 
natures  in  the  impudence  of  their  claims Literature 
and  Life . 

THE  SHAKESPEARIAN  WORLD. 

In  his  deep,  wide,  and  searching  observation  of  man  - 
kind, Shakespeare  detects  bodies  of  men  who  agree  in 
the  general  tendencies  of  their  characters,  who  strive, 
after  a common  ideal  of  good  and  evil,  and  who  all  fail 
to  reach  it.  Through  these  indications  and  hints  he 
seizes,  by  his  philosophical  genius,  the  law  of  the  class  ; 
by  his  dramatic  genius,  he  gathers  up  in  one  concep- 
tion the  whole  multitude  of  individuals  comprehended 


218 


ED  IV! AT  PERCY  WHIPPLE 


in  the  law,  and  embodies  it  in  a character  ; and  by  his 
poetical  genius  he  lifts  this  character  into  an  ideal  re- 
gion of  life,  where  all  hindrances  to  the  free  and  full 
development  of  its  nature  are  removed.  The  character 
seems  all  the  more  natural  because  it  is  perfect  of  its 
kind,  whereas  the  actual  persons  included  in  the  con- 
ception are  imperfect  of  their  kind.  Thus,  there  are 
many  men  of  the  type  of  Falstaff,  but  Shakespeare’s 
Falstaff  is  not  an  actual  Falstaff.  Falstaff  is  the  ideal 
head  of  the  family,  the  possibility  which  they  dimly 
strive  to  realize,  the  person  they  would  be  if  they 
could.  Again,  there  are  many  Iagoish  men,  but  only 
one  Iago,  the  ideal  type  of  them  all  ; and  by  studying 
him  we  learn  what  they  would  all  become  if  circum- 
stances were  propitious,  and  their  loose,  malignant 
tendencies  were  firmly  knit  together  in  positive  will 
and  diabolically  alert  intelligence.  And  it  is  the  same 
with  the  rest  of  Shakespeare’s  great  creations.  The 
immense  domain  of  human  nature  they  cover  is  due  to 
the  fact,  not  merely  that  they  are  not  repetitions  of 
individuals,  but  that  they  are  not  repetitions  of  the 
same  types  or  classes  of  individuals.  The  moment  we 
analyze  them,  the  moment  we  break  them  up  into 
their  constituent  elements,  we  are  amazed  at  the 
wealth  of  wisdom  and  knowledge  which  formed  the 
materials  of  each  individual  embodiment,  and  the  in- 
exhaustible interest  and  fulness  of  meaning  and  appli- 
cation revealed  in  the  analytic  scrutiny  of  each.  Com- 
pare, for  example,  Shakespeare’s  Timon  of  Athens — by 
no  means  one  of  Shakespeare’s  mightest  efforts  of 
characterization — with  Lord  Byron,  both  as  man  and 
poet,  and  we  shall  find  that  Timon  is  the  highest  logi- 
cal result  of  the  Byronic  tendency,  and  that  in  him, 
rather  than  in  Byron,  the  essential  misanthrope  is  im- 
personated. The  number  of  poems  which  Byron  wrote 
does  not  affect  the  matter  at  all,  because  the  poems  are 
all  expansions  and  variations  of  one  view  of  life,  from 
which  Byron  could  not  escape.  Shakespeare,  had  he 
pleased,  might  have  filled  volumes  with  Timon’s  poetic 
misanthrophy  ; but,  being  a condenser,  he  was  content- 
ed with  concentrating  the  idea  of  the  whole  class  in 
one  grand  character,  and  of  putting  into  his  mouth  the 


EDWIN  PERCY  WHIPPLE 


219 


truest,  most  splendid,  most  terrible  things  which  have 
ever  been  uttered  from  the  misanthropic  point  of  view ; 
and  then,  victoriously  freeing  himself  from  the  dread- 
ful mood  of  mind  he  had  imaginatively  realized,  he 
passed  on  to  occupy  other  and  different  natures. 
Shakespeare  is  superior  to  Byron  on  Byron’s  own 
ground,  because  Shakespeare  grasped  misanthropy 
from  its  first  faint  beginnings  in  the  soul  to  its  final 
result  on  character — clutched  its  inmost  essence — dis-  \ 
cerned  it  as  one  of  a hundred  subjective  conditions  of 
mind — tried  it  thoroughly,  and  found  it  was  too  weak 
and  narrow  to  hold  him.  Byron  was  in  it,  could  not 
escape  from  it,  and  never,  therefore,  thoroughly  mas- 
tered the  philosophy  of  it.  Here,  then,  in  one  corner 
of  Shakespeare’s  mind,  we  find  more  than  ample  space 
for  so  great  a poet  as  Byron  to  house  himself. 

But  Shakespeare  not  only  in  one  conception  thus  in- 
dividualizes a whole  class  of  men,  but  he  communicates 
to  each  character,  be  it  little  or  colossal,  good  or  evil, 
that  peculiar  Shakespearean  quality  which  distinguishes 
it  as  his  creation.  This  he  does  by  being  and  living 
for  the  time  the  person  he  conceives.  What  Macaulay 
says  of  Bacon  is  more  applicable  to  Shakespeare;  name- 
ly, that  his  mind  resembles  the  tent  which  the  fairy 
gave  to  Prince  Ahmed.  “ Fold  it,  and  it  seemed  a toy 
for  the  hand  of  a lady.  Spread  it,  and  the  armies  of 
powerful  sultans  might  repose  beneath  its  shade.” 
Shakespeare  could  run  his  sentiment,  passion,  reason, 
imagination,  into  any  mould  or  personality  he  was  ca- 
pable of  shaping,  and  think  and  speak  from  that.  The 
result  is  that  every  character  is  a denizen  of  the 
Shakespearean  world  ; every  character,  from  Master 
Slender  to  Ariel,  is  in  some  sense  a poet ; that  is,  is 
gifted  with  imagination  to  express  his  whole  nature, 
and  to  make  himself  inwardly  known  ; yet  we  feel 
throughout  that  the  “ thousand-souled  ” Shakespeare 
is  still  but  one  soul,  capable  of  shifting  into  a thousand 
forms,  but  leaving  the  peculiar  birth-mark  on  every  in- 
dividual it  forms.—  The  Literature  of  the  Age  of  Queen 
Elizabeth . 


WHITCHER,  Frances  Miriam,  an  American 
humorous  writer,  born  at  Whitesboro,  N.  Y.,  No- 
vember i,  1 8 1 1 ; died  there,  January  4,  1852.  She 
was  the  daughter  of  Lewis  Berry,  was  educated 
in  village-schools,  and  in  1847  was  married  to  the 
Rev.  Benjamin  W.  Whitcher,  pastor  of  a Protes- 
tant Episcopal  Church  at  Elmira,  N.  Y.,  where 
she  resided  until  1850.  She  contributed  to  maga- 
zines and  journals,  and  illustrated  some  of  her 
works.  Her  writings  were  published  collectively 
after  her  death.  These  are:  The  Widow  Bedott 
Papers , with  an  Introduction  by  Alice  B.  Neal 
(1855),  and  Widoiv  Spriggins , Mary  Elmer , and 
Other  Sketches , edited,  with  a Memoir,  by  Mrs.  M. 
L.  Ward  Whitcher  (1867). 

HEZEKIAH  BEDOTT, 

He  was  a wonderful  hand  to  moralize,  husband  was, 
"specially  after  he  begun  to  enjoy  poor  health.  He 
made  an  observation  once,  when  he  was  in  one  of  his 
poor  turns,  that  I never  shall  forget  the  longest  day  I 
live.  He  says  to  me  one  winter  evenin’  by  the  fire — I 
was  knittin’  (I  was  always  a wonderful  great  knitter) 
and  he  was  smokin’  (he  was  a master  hand  to  smoke, 
though  the  doctor  used  to  tell  him  he’d  be  better  off  to 
let  tobacket*  alone ; when  he  was  well,  used  to  take  his 
pipe  and  smoke  a spell  after  he’d  got  the  chores  done 
up,  and  when  he  wa'n’t  well,  used  to  smoke  the  biggest 
part  o’  the  time).  Well,  he  says  to  me,  says  he,  “ Silly,” 
(my  name  was  Prissillv  naterally,  but  he  ginerally  called 

(35K>) 


FRANCES  MIRIAM  WFUTCHER 


221 


me  “ Silly,”  'cause  ’twas  handier,  you  know).  Well,  he 
says  to  me,  says  he,  “ Silly,”  and  he  looked  pretty  sollem{ 
I tell  you  ; he  had  a sollem  countenance  naterally — and 
after  he  got  to  be  deacon  ’twas  more  so,  but  since  he’d  lost 
his  nealth  he  looked  sollemer  than  ever,  and  certingly 
you  wouldn’t  wonder  at  it  if  you  knowed  how  much  he 
underwent.  He  was  troubled  with  a wonderful  pain  in  his 
chest,  and  amazin’  weakness  in  the  spine  of  his  back, 
besides  the  pleurissy  in  the  side,  and  having  the  ager  a 
considerable  part  of  the  time,  and  bein’  broke  of  his 
rest  o’  nights  ’cause  he  was  so  put  to ’t  for  breath  when 
ne  laid  down.  Why,  it  is  an  onaccountable  fact  that 
when  that  man  died  he  hadn’t  seen  a well  day  in  fifteen 
year,  though  when  he  was  married  and  for  five  or  six 
year  after  I shouldn’t  desire  to  see  a ruggeder  man  than 
what  he  was.  But  the  time  I’m  speakin’  of  he’d  been 
out  of  health  nigh  upon  ten  year,  and  O dear  sakes  ! 
how  he  had  altered  since  the  first  time  I ever  see  him ! 
That  was  to  a quiltin’  to  Squire  Smith’s  a spell  afore 
Sally  was  married.  I’d  no  idee  then  that  Sal  Smith  was 
a gwine  to  be  married  to  Sam  Pendergrass.  She’d  ben 
keepin’  company  with  Mose  Hewlitt  for  better’n  a year, 
and  everybody  said  that  was  a settled  thing,  and  lo  and 
behold  ! all  of  a sudding  she  up  and  took  Sam  Pender* 
grass.  Well,  that  was  the  first  time  I ever  see  my  hus- 
band, and  if  anybody’d  told  me  then  that  I should  ever 
marry  him,  I should  a said— 

But  I was  a gwine  to  tell  you  what  my  husband  said. 
He  says  to  me,  says  he,  “ Silly  ”;  says  I,  “ What  ? ” I 
didn’t  say  “ What,  Hezekier  ? ” for  I didn’t  like  his  name. 
The  first  time  I ever  heard  it  I near  killed  myself  a laffink 
“ Hezekier  Bedott,”  says  I,  “ well,  I would  give  up  if  I 
had  sich  a name  ; ” but  then  you  know  I had  no  more 
idee  o’  marryin’  the  feller  than  you  had  this  minute  o’ 
marryin’  the  governor.  I s’pose  you  think  it’s  curus  we 
should  a named  our  oldest  son  Hezekier.  Well,  we 
done  it  to  please  father  and  mother  Bedott.  It’s  father 
Bedott’s  name,  and  he  and  mother  Bedott  both  used 
to  think  that  names  had  ought  to  go  down  from  ginera- 
tion  to  gineration.  But  we  always  called  him  Kier,  you 
know.  Speakin’  o’  Kier,  he  is  a blessin’,  ain’t  he?  and 
I ain’t  the  only  one  that  thinks  so,  I guess.  Now  don't 


222 


PRANCES  MIRIAM  WHITCHER 


you  never  tell  nobody  that  I said  so,  but  between  you 
and  me  I rather  guess  that  if  Kezier  Winkle  thinks  she 
is  a gwine  to  ketch  Kier  Bedott  she  is  a leetle  out  of  her 
reckonin’.  But  I was  going  to  tell  what  husband  said. 
He  says  to  me,  says  he,  “ Silly,”  I says,  says  I,  “ What  ?” 
If  I didn’t  say  “What,”  when  he  said  “ Silly,”  he’d  a 
kept  on  saying  “ Silly,”  from  time  to  eternity.  He  al- 
ways did,  because,  you  know,  he  wanted  me  to  pay  par- 
ticular attention,  and  I ginerally  did  ; no  woman  was 
ever  more  attentive  to  her  husband  than  what  I was. 
Well,  he  says  to  me,  says  he,  “Silly.”  Says  I “What?” 
though  I’d  no  idee  what  he  was  gwine  to  say,  didn’t 
know  but  what  ’twas  something  about  his  sufferings, 
though  he  wa’n’t  apt  to  complain,  but  he  frequently 
used  to  remark  that  he  wouldn’t  wish  his  first  enemy  to 
suffer  one  minnit  as  he  did  all  the  time,  but  that  can’t 
be  called  grumblin’ — think  it  can  ? Why,  I’ve  seen  him 
in  situations  when  you’d  a thought  no  mortal  could  a 
helped  grumblin’,  but  he  didn’t.  He  and  me  went  once 
in  the  dead  o’winter  in  a one-hoss  slay  out  to  Boonville 
to  see  a sister  o’  hisen.  You  know  the  snow  is  amazin’ 
deep  in  that  section  o’  the  kentry.  Well,  the  hoss  got 
stuck  in  one  o’  them  are  flambergasted  snow-banks,  and 
there  we  sot,  onable  to  stir,  and  to  cap  all,  while  we  was 
a sittin’  there  husband  was  took  with  a dretful  crick  in 
his  back.  Now  that  was  what  I call  a per  dicker  ment, 
don’t  you  ? Most  men  would  a swore,  but  husband 
didn’t.  He  only  said,  said  he,  “ Consarn  it.”  How  did 
we  get  out,  did  you  ask  ? Why  we  might  a been  sittin’ 
there  to  this  day,  fur  as  / know,  if  there  hadn’t  a hap- 
pened to  come  along  a mess  o’  men  in  a double  team 
end  they  hysted  us  out.  But  I was  gwine  to  tell  you 
that  observation  o’  hisen.  Says  he  to  me,  says  he, 
“Silly  ” (I  could  see  by  the  light  o’  the  fire,  there  didn’t 
happen  to  be  no  candle  burnin’,  if  I don’t  disremember, 
though  my  memory  is  sometimes  ruther  forgitful,  but  I 
know  we  wa’n’t  apt  to  burn  candles  exceptin’  when  we 
had  company).  I could  see  by  the  light  of  the  fire  that 
his  mind  was  oncommon  solemnized.  Says  he  to  me, 
says  he,  “ Silly.”  Says  I,  “What?”  He  says  to  me, 
says  he,  “ We're  all  Poor  critters  ! ” — Widow  Bedott 
Papers. 


WHITE,  Gilbert,  an  English  clergyman  and 
naturalist,  borne  at  Selborne,  Hampshire,  July  18, 
1720;  died  at  Oxford,  June  20, 1793.  He  received 
his  education  at  Basingstoke,  under  the  Rev. 
Thomas  Warton,  and  at  Oxford.  He  was  a Fel- 
low of  Oriel  College,  and  was  made  one  of  the 
senior  proctors  of  the  university  in  1752.  He 
soon  fixed  his  residence  in  his  native  village, 
where  he  passed  a quiet  life  in  study,  especially 
in  close  observation  of  nature.  His  principal 
work,  The  Natural  History  of  Selborne  (1789 ; new 
44  edition  with  notes  by  Frank  Buckland,”  1875), 
is  a model  of  its  kind,  of  enduring  interest;  it  was 
soon  translated  into  German.  It  deals  with  a great 
variety  of  phenomena  that  came  under  the  au- 
thor’s notice,  and  is  in  the  form  of  letters.  Thomas 
Brown’s  edition  (1875)  contains  Observations  on 
Various  Parts  of  Nature  and  The  Naturalist's  CaU 
endar , first  published  after  the  author’s  death.  In 
1876  appeared  a volume  of  White’s  unpublished 
letters.  44  Who  ever  read  without  the  most  ex- 
quisite delight  White’s  History  of  Selborne  ? ” says 
Blackwood' s.  44  It  is,  indeed,  a Sabbath-book,  with 
a whole  library  of  sermons,  nine-tenths  of  the 
Bampton  Lectures  included,  and  will  make  a 
Deist  of  an  Atheist,  of  a Deist  a Christian.” 

44  A man  the  power  of  whose  writings  has  im- 
mortalized an  obscure  village  and  a tortoise  . . * 
as  long  as  the  English  language  lives.” 

(223). 


224 


GILBERT  WHITE 


THE  HOUSE-MARTEN. 

Selborne,  November  20,  1773. 

Dear  Sir:  In  obedience  to  your  injunctions,  I sit 
down  to  give  you  some  account  of  the  house-marten,  or 
mariet ; and,  if  my  monography  of  this  little  domestic 
and  familiar  bird  should  happen  to  meet  with  your  ap- 
probation, I may  probably  soon  extend  my  inquiries  to 
the  rest  of  the  British  hirundines — the  swallow,  the  swift, 
and  the  bank-marten. 

A few  house-martens  begin  to  appear  about  the  16th 
of  April  ; usually  some  few  days  later  than  the  swallow. 
For  some  time  after  they  appear,  the  hiru?idines  in  gen- 
eral pay  no  attention  to  the  business  of  nidification,  but 
play  and  sport  about,  either  to  recruit  from  the  fatigue 
of  their  journey,  if  they  do  migrate  at  all,  or  else  that 
their  blood  may  recover  its  true  tone  and  texture  after 
it  has  been  so  long  benumbed  by  the  severities  of  win* 
ter.  About  the  middle  of  May,  if  the  weather  be  fine, 
the  marten  begins  to  think  in  earnest  of  providing  a 
mansion  for  its  family.  The  crust  or  shell  of  this  nest 
seems  to  be  formed  of  such  dirt  or  loam  as  comes  most 
readily  to  hand,  and  is  tempered  and  wrought  together 
with  little  bits  of  broken  straws,  to  render  it  tough  and 
tenacious.  As  this  bird  often  builds  against  a perpen- 
dicular wall,  without  any  projecting  ledge  under  it,  it 
requires  its  utmost  efforts  to  get  the  first  foundation 
firmly  fixed,  so  that  it  may  safely  carry  the  superstruct- 
ure. On  this  occasion  the  bird  not  only  clings  with  its 
claws,  but  partly  supports  itself  by  strongly  inclining 
its  tail  against  the  wall,  making  that  a fulcrum ; and, 
thus  steadied,  it  works  and  plasters  the  materials  into 
the  face  of  the  brick  or  stone.  But  then,  that  this  work 
may  not,  while  it  is  soft  and  green,  pull  itself  down  by 
its  own  weight,  the  provident  architect  has  prudence 
and  forbearance  enough  not  to  advance  her  work  too 
fast ; but,  by  building  only  in  the  morning,  and  by  ded- 
icating the  rest  of  the  day  to  food  and  amusement,  gives 
It  sufficient  time  to  dry  and  harden.  About  half  an 
inch  seems  to  be  a sufficient  layer  for  a day.  Thus 
eareful  workmen,  when  they  build  mud-walls  (informed 


GILBERT  WHITE 


225 


at  first,  perhaps,  by  this  little  bird),  raise  but  a mod* 
erate  layer  at  a time,  and  then  desist,  lest  the  work 
should  become  top-heavy,  and  so  be  ruined  by  its  own 
weight.  By  this  method,  in  about  ten  or  twelve  days, 
is  formed  an  hemispheric  nest,  with  a small  aperture 
toward  the  top,  strong,  compact,  and  warm,  and  per- 
fectly fitted  for  all  the  purposes  for  which  it  was  in- 
tended. But  then,  nothing  is  more  common  than  for  a 
house-sparrow,  as  soon  as  the  shell  as  finished,  to  seize 
on  it  as  its  own,  to  eject  the  owner,  and  to  line  it  after 
its  own  manner. 

After  so  much  labor  is  bestowed  in  erecting  a man- 
sion, as  Nature  seldom  works  in  vain,  martens  will 
breed  on  for  several  years  together  in  the  same  nest, 
when  it  happens  to  be  well  sheltered  and  secure  from 
the  injuries  of  weather.  The  shell,  or  crust,  of  the  nest 
is  a sort  of  rustic  work,  full  of  knobs  and  protuberances 
on  the  outside  ; nor  is  the  inside  of  those  that  I have 
examined  smoothed  with  any  exactness  at  all ; but  is 
rendered  soft  and  warm,  and  fit  for  incubation,  by  a 
lining  of  small  straws,  grasses,  and  feathers  ; and  some- 
times by  a bed  of  moss,  interwoven  with  wool.  . . . 

As  the  young  of  small  birds  presently  arrive  at  their 
full  growth,  they  soon  become  impatient  of  confine- 
ment, and  sit  all  day  with  their  heads  out  at  the  orifice, 
where  the  dams,  by  clinging  to  the  nest,  supply  them 
with  food  from  morning  to  night.  For  a time  the 
young  are  fed  on  the  wing  by  their  parents ; but  the 
feat  is  done  by  so  quick  and  almost  imperceptible  a 
sleight  that  a person  must  have  attended  very  exactly 
to  their  motions  before  he  would  be  able  to  perceive  it. 
As  soon  as  the  young  are  able  to  shift  for  themselves, 
the  dams  immediately  turn  their  thoughts  to  the  busi- 
ness of  a second  brood ; while  the  first  flight,  shaken 
off  and  rejected  by  their  nurses,  congregate  in  great 
flocks,  and  are  the  birds  that  are  seen  clustering  and 
hovering,  on  sunny  mornings  and  evenings,  round 
towers  and  steeples,  and  on  the  roofs  of  churches  and 
houses.  These  congregations  usually  begin  to  take 
place  about  the  first  week  in  August ; and,  therefore 
we  may  conclude  that  by  that  time  the  first  flight  fa 
pretty  well  over.  The  voung  of  this  species  do  not 


226 


GILBERT  WHITE 


quit  their  abodes  altogether ; but  the  more  forward  birds 
get  abroad  some  days  before  the  rest.  These,  approach- 
ing the  eaves  of  buildings,  and  playing  about  before 
them,  make  people  think  that  several  old  ones  attend 
one  nest.  They  are  often  capricious  in  fixing  on  a 
nesting-place,  beginning  many  edifices,  and  leaving 
them  unfinished  ; but  when  once  a nest  is  completed  in 
a sheltered  place,  it  serves  for  several  seasons.  Those 
that  breed  in  a ready  finished  house  get  the  start,  in 
hatching,  of  those  that  build  new,  by  ten  days  or  a fort- 
night. These  industrious  artificers  are  at  their  labors 
in  the  long  days  before  four  in  the  morning  : when 
they  fix  their  materials,  they  plaster  them  on  their 
chins,  moving  their  heads  with  a quick,  vibratory  mo- 
tion. They  dip  and  wash  as  they  fly  sometimes,  in 
very  hot  weather,  but  not  so  frequently  as  swallows. 
It  has  been  observed  that  martens  usually  build  to  a 
northeast  or  northwest  aspect,  that  the  heat  of  the  sun 
may  not  crack  and  destroy  their  nests : but  instances 
are  also  remembered  where  they  bred  for  many  years 
in  vast  abundance  in  a hot,  stifled  inn-yard  against  a 
wail  facing  to  the  south. 

Birds  in  general  are  wise  in  their  choice  of  situation  ; 
but,  in  this  neighborhood,  every  summer,  is  seen  a strong 
proof  to  the  contrary,  at  a house  without  eaves,  in  an 
exposed  district,  where  sometimes  martens  build  year 
by  year  in  the  corners  of  windows.  But  as  the  corners 
of  these  windows  (which  face  to  the  southeast  and 
southwest)  are  too  shallow,  the  nests  are  washed  down 
every  hard  rain ; and  yet  these  birds  drudge  on  to  no 
purpose,  from  summer  to  summer,  without  changing 
their  aspect  or  house.  It  is  a piteous  sight  to  see  them 
laboring  when  half  their  nest  is  washed  away,  and 
bringing  dirt  “ generis  lapsi  sarcire  ruinas .**  Thus  is  in- 
stinct a most  wonderfully  unequal  faculty  ; in  some  in- 
stances so  much  above  reason,  in  other  respects  so  far 
below  it ! Martens  love  to  frequent  towers,  especially 
if  there  are  great  lakes  and  rivers  at  hand  ; nay,  they 
even  effect  the  close  air  of  London.  And  I have  not 
only  seen  them  nesting  in  the  Borough,  but  even  in  the 
Strand  and  Fleet  Street ; but  then  it  was  obvious,  from 
the  dinginess  of  their  aspect,  that  their  feathers  partook 


GILBERT  WHITE 


227 


of  the  filth  of  that  sooty  atmosphere.  Martens  are  by 
far  the  least  agile  of  the  four  species  ; their  wings  and 
tails  are  short,  and  therefore  they  are  not  capable  of  such 
surprising  turns,  and  quick-glancing  evolutions  as  the 
swallow.  Accordingly,  they  make  use  of  a placid,  easy 
motion,  in  a middle  region  of  the  air,  seldom  mounting 
to  any  great  height,  and  never  sweeping  along  together 
over  the  surface  of  the  ground  or  water.  They  do  not 
wander  far  for  food,  but  affect  sheltered  districts,  over 
some  lake,  or  under  some  hanging  wood,  or  in  some 
hollow  vale,  especially  in  windy  weather.  They  breed 
the  latest  of  all  swallow-kind  : in  1772,  they  had  nest- 
lings on  to  October  2 1st,  and  are  never  without  unfledged 
young  as  late  as  Michaelmas. 

As  the  summer  declines,  the  congregating  flocks  in- 
crease in  numbers  daily  by  the  constant  accession  of 
the  second  broods  : till  at  last  they  swarm  in  myriads 
upon  myriads  round  the  villages  on  the  Thames,  dark- 
ening the  face  of  the  sky  as  they  frequent  the  aits  of 
that  river,  where  they  roost.  They  retire,  the  bulk  of 
them,  I mean,  in  vast  flocks  together,  about  the  begin- 
ning of  October  ; but  have  appeared  of  late  years,  in  a 
considerable  flight,  in  this  neighborhood,  for  one  day  or 
two,  as  late  as  November  the  third  or  sixth,  after  they 
were  supposed  to  have  been  gone  for  more  than  a fort- 
night. They,  therefore,  withdraw  with  us  the  latest  of 
any  species.  Unless  these  birds  are  very  short-lived, 
indeed,  or  unless  they  do  not  return  to  the  district 
where  there  they  are  bred,  they  must  undergo  vast  dev- 
astations somehow,  or  somewhere  ; for  the  birds  that 
return  yearly  bear  no  manner  of  proportion  to  the  birds 
that  retir -Natural  History  of  Selborne . 


VOL.  XXIV 


WHITE,  Henry  Kirke,  an  English  poet,  born 
at  Nottingham,  March  21,  1785;  died  at  Cam- 
bridge, October  19,  1806.  He  was  the  son  of  a 
butcher,  and  assisted  in  his  father’s  shop  until  the 
age  of  fourteen,  when  he  was  apprenticed  to  a 
stocking- weaver,  but  was  soon  afterward  placed 
.At  an  attorney’s  office,  where  he  applied  his  leis- 
ure hours  to  study,  acquiring  some  knowledge  of 
Latin,  Greek,  Italian,  Spanish,  and  Portuguese. 
Before  he  was  sixteen  he  had  gained  several 
prizes  offered  by  periodicals,  and  in  1803  he  put 
forth  a small  volume  of  poems,  with  the  hope,  he 
says,  that  its  publication  would  enable  him  “to 
pursue  those  inclinations  which  might  one  day 
place  him  in  an  honorable  station  in  the  scale  of 
society.”  A sizarship  was  obtained  for  him  at  St. 
John’s  College,  Cambridge,  and  friends  furnished 
funds  sufficient  for  his  maintenance  while  prepar- 
ing himself  for  the  Church.  At  the  close  of  his 
Srst  term  he  was  pronounced  20  be  the  first 
man  of  his  year.  His  health  broke  down  under 
his  severe  studies,  and  he  died  soon  after  entering 
upon  his  twenty-second  year.  His  Remains  were 
edited  by  Southey,  with  a touching  Memoir , and 
a memorial  tablet,  with  a medallion  portrait  by 
Chantrey,  was  placed  in  Ail  Saints’  Church,  Cam- 
bridge. Kirke  White’s  poems  were,  with  the  ex- 
ception of  a few  stanzas,  written  before  his  fwen* 


HENRY  KIRKE  WHITE 


229 


tieth  year,  and  previous  to  his  entering  the  Uni- 
versity. Clifton  Grove , the  longest  of  his  poems, 
is  somewhat  after  the  manner  of  Goldsmith’s  De» 
serted  Village.  He  left  uncompleted  a more  ambi- 
tious effort — The  Christian ; 

THE  STAR  OF  BETHLEHEM. 

When  marshalled  on  the  nightly  plain 
The  glittering  host  bestud  the  sky. 

One  star  alone,  of  all  the  train 

Can  fix  the  sinner’s  wandering  eye. 

Hark  1 hark  ! to  God  the  chorus  break* 

From  every  host,  from  every  gem 

But  one  alone  the  Saviour  speaks  : 

It  is  the  Star  of  Bethlehem. 

Once  on  the  raging  seas  I rode  ; 

The  stoim  was  loud,  the  sight  was  dark ; 

The  ocean  yawned  ; and  rudely  blowed 
The  wind  that  tossed  my  foundering  bark. 

Deep  horror  then  my  vitals  froze, 

Death-struck,  I ceased  the  tide  to  stem. 

When  suddenly  a star  arose  : 

It  was  the  Star  of  Bethlehem. 

It  was  my  guide,  my  light,  my  all, 

It  bade  my  dark  forebodings  cease, 

And  through  the  storm  and  dangers’  thrall. 

It  led  me  to  the  port  of  peace. 

Now  safely  moored— my  perils  o’er— 

I’ll  sing,  first  in  night’s  diadem, 

Forever  and  forevermore, 

The  Star—the  Star  of  Bethlehem. 

TO  AN  EARLY  PRIMROSE. 

Mild  offspring  of  a dark  and  sullen  sire  f 

Whose  modest  form,  so  delicately  fine, 

Was  nursed  in  whirling  storms. 

And  cradled  in  the  winds  1 


HENRY  K1RKE  WHITE 


Thee,  when  young  Spring  first  questioned  Winter's 
sway 

And  dared  the  sturdy  blusterer  to  the  fight, 

Thee  on  this  bank  he  threw 
To  mark  the  victory. 

In  this  low  vale,  the  promise  of  the  year, 

Serene  thou  openest  to  the  nipping  gale. 

Unnoticed  and  alone 
Thy  tender  elegance. 

So  Virtue  blooms,  brought  forth  amid  the  storm 

Of  chill  adversity  ; in  some  lone  walk  of  life 
She  rears  her  head, 

Obscure  and  unobserved, 

While  every  bleaching  breeze  that  on  her  blows, 

Chastens  her  spotless  purity  of  breast. 

And  hardens  her  to  bear 
Serene  the  ills  of  life. 


WHITE,  Richard  Grant,  an  American  essay, 
ist,  critic,  and  Shakespearean  scholar,  born  in 
New  York,  May  22,  1821;  died  there,  April  8, 
1885.  He  was  graduated  at  the  University  of  the 
City  of  New  York;  studied  law, and  was  admitted 
to  the  bar  in  1845.  But  he  previously  had  turned 
his  attention  to  literature,  and  never  entered  upon 
legal  practice.  Before  he  had  reached  his  major- 
ity  he  published  anonymously  a fine  sonnet  upon 
Washington,  which  came  to  be  attributed  to  more 
than  one  poet  of  note — among  whom  were  Words- 
worth and  Landor.  Without  being  ostensibly  the 
editor  of  any  periodical,  he  was  editorially  con- 
nected with  several  newspapers  and  magazines. 
For  more  than  twenty  years — ending  in  1878 — he 
held  positions  in  the  United  States  Revenue  Ser- 
vice at  New  York.  His  works,  while  covering  a 
wide  range  of  topics,  relate  mainly  to  general 
philology,  and  especially  to  Shakespeare  and  his 
writings.  His  most  important  works  are  Hand- 
book of  Christian  Art  (1853);  Shakespeare' s Scholar 
(1854);  Three  Parts  of  Henry  VI.  (1859);  National 
Hymns  (1861);  Life  and  Genius  of  Shakespeare 
(1865) ; The  New  Gospel  of  Peace  (1866) ; Words  and 
Their  Uses  (1870);  Every-day  English  (1880) ; Eng- 
land Without  and  Within  (1881);  The  Fate  of  Mans- 
field Humphrey  (1884);  Studies  in  Shakespeare 
(1885),  and  History  of  Italian  Opera  in  New  York . 

C231)  ..  p 


,2 


nWHARD  GRANT  UW!TW. 


WASHINGTON  : PATER  PATUA. 

High  over  ail  whom  might  or  mind  made  great. 
Yielding  the  conqueror’s  crown  to  harder  hearts* 
Exalted  not  by  politicians’  arts. 

Yet  with  a will  to  meet  and  master  Fate 

And  skill  to  rule  a young,  divided  state, 

Greater  by  what  was  not  than  what  was  done. 
Alone  on  History’s  height  stands  Washington  ; 

And  teeming  Time  shall  not  bring  forth  his  mate. 
For  only  he,  of  men,  on  earth  was  sent 

In  all  the  might  of  mind’s  integrity ; 

Ne’er  as  in  him  truth,  strength,  and  wisdom  blent ; 

And  that  his  glory  might  eternal  be, 

A boundless  country  is  his  monument, 

A mighty  nation  his  posterity. 

SHAKESPEARE’S  CREATIVE  GENIUS. 

Shakespeare  used  the  skeletons  of  former  life  that 
had  drifted  down  to  him  upon  the  stream  of  time,  and 
were  cast  at  his  feet  a heap  of  mere  dead  matter.  But 
he  clothed  them  with  flesh  and  blood,  and  breathed  in- 
to their  nostrils  ; and  they  lived  and  moved  with  a life 
that  was  individual  and  self-existent  after  he  had  once 
thrown  it  off  from  his  own  exuberant  intellectual  vital- 
ity. He  made  his  plays  no  galleries  of  portraits  of  his 
contemporaries,  carefully  seeking  his  models  through 
the  social  scale,  from  king  to  beggar.  His  teeming 
brain  bred  lowlier  beggars  and  kinglier  kings  than  all 
Europe  could  have  furnished  as  subjects  for  his  por- 
traiture. He  found  in  his  own  consciousness  ideals, 
the  like  of  which,  for  beauty  or  deformity,  neither  he 
nor  any  other  man  had  ever  looked  upon.  In  his  heart 
were  the  motives,  the  passions  of  all  humanity  ; in  his 
mind  the  capability,  if  not  the  actuality,  of  all  human 
thought.  Nature,  in  forming  him,  alone  of  all  the 
poets,  had  laid  that  touch  upon  his  soul  which  enabled 
him  to  live  at  will  throughout  all  time,  among  all 
peoples. 

Capable  thus,  in  his  complete  and  symmetrical  nat- 


ttfC&AMfr  GRANT  WMtTB 


ore,  of  feeling  with  and  thinking  for  all  mankind, 
found  in  an  isolated  and  momentary  phase  of  his  own 
existence  the  law  which  governed  the  life  of  those  to 
whom  that  single  phase  was  their  whole  sphere.  From 
the  germ  within  himself  he  produced  the  perfect  indi- 
vidual as  it  had  been  or  might  have  been  developed. 
The  eternal  laws  of  human  life  were  his  servants  by  his 
heaven-bestowed  prerogative,  and  he  was  yet  their  in- 
strument. Conformed  to  them  because  instinct  with 
them,  obedient  to  yet  swaying  them,  he  used  their  sub- 
tle and  unerring  powers  to  work  out  from  seemingly 
trivial  and  independent  truths  the  vast  problems  of  hu- 
manity ; and,  standing  ever  within  the  limits  of  his  own 
experience,  he  read  and  reproduced  the  inner  life  of 
those  on  the  loftiest  heights  or  in  the  lowest  depths  of 
being,  with  the  certainty  of  the  physiologist  who  from 
the  study  of  his  own  organization  re-creates  the  mon- 
sters of  the  ante-human  world,  or  of  the  astronomer 
who,  not  moving  from  his  narrow  study,  announced  the 
place,  form,  movement,  and  condition  of  a planet  then 
hid  from  earthly  eyes  in  the  abyss  of  space. 

Shakespeare  thus  suffered  not  even  a temporary  ab- 
sorption of  his  personages ; he  lost  not  the  least  con- 
sciousness of  selfhood,  or  the  creators  power  over  the 
clay  he  was  moulding.  He  was  at  no  time  a murder- 
er in  his  heart  because  he  drew  Macbeth,  or  mad  be- 
cause he  made  King  Lear.  We  see  that,  although  he 
thinks  with  the  brain  and  feels  with  the  soul  of  each  of 
his  personages  by  turns,  he  has  the  power  of  deliberate 
introspection  during  this  strange  metempsychosis,  and 
of  standing  outside  of  his  transmuted  self,  and  regard- 
ing these  forms  which  his  mind  takes  on  as  we  do ; in 
a word,  of  being  at  the  same  time  actor  and  spectator, 
— Life  and  Genius  of  Shakespeare. 

WAR  IN  THE  LAND  OF  UNCLE  SAM, 

Now  the  war  in  the  land  of  Unculpsalm  was  in  this 
wise  : 

The  people  were  of  one  blood,  but  the  land  was  in 
many  provinces.  And  the  people  of  the  provinces 
joined  themselves  together  and  cast  off  the  yoke  of  % 


234 


BMC  HARD  GRANT  WHITE 


stilf-necked  king  who  oppressed  them  beyond  the  great 
sea.  And  they  said,  Let  us  have  no  king,  but  let  us 
choose  from  ourselves  a man  to  rule  over  us  ; and  let  us 
no  longer  be  many  provinces,  but  one  nation ; only  in 
those  things  which  concern  not  the  nation  let  the  peo- 
ple in  each  province  do  what  is  right  in  their  own  eyes. 

And  let  it  be  written  upon  parchment  and  be  for  a 
covenant  between  us  and  our  children,  and  our  chil- 
dren’s children  forever — like  unto  a law  of  the  Medes 
and  Persians,  which  altereth  not. 

And  they  did  so.  And  the  Great  Covenant  became 
the  beginning  and  the  end  of  all  things  unto  the  men  of 
Unculpsalm. 

And  the  men  of  Unculpsalm  waxed  great  and  mighty 
and  rich  : and  the  earth  was  filled  with  the  fame  of 
their  power  and  their  riches ; and  their  ships  covered 
the  sea.  And  all  nations  feared  them.  But  they  were 
men  of  peace,  and  went  not  to  war  of  their  own  accord  ; 
neither  did  they  trouble  nor  oppress  the  men  of  other 
nations  but  sought,  each  man,  to  sit  under  his  own  vine 
and  his  own  fig-tree.  And  there  were  no  poor  men  and 
few  that  did  evil  born  in  that  land  ; except  thou  go 
southward  of  the  border  of  Masunandicsun. 

And  this  was  noised  abroad  ; and  it  came  to  pass  that 
the  poor  and  the  down-trodden  and  the  oppressed  of 
other  lands  left  the  lands  in  which  they  were  born,  and 
went  and  dwelt  in  the  land  of  Unculpsalm,  and  pros- 
pered therein,  and  no  man  molested  them.  And  they 
loved  that  land. 

Wherefore  the  kings  and  the  oppressors  of  other 
lands,  and  they  that  devoured  the  substance  of  the  peo- 
ple, hated  the  men  of  Unculpsalm.  Yet,  although  they 
were  men  of  peace,  they  made  not  war  upon  them ; for 
they  were  many  and  mighty.  Moreover,  they  were  rich 
and  bought  merchandise  of  other  nations,  and  sent 
them  corn  and  gold. 

Now  there  were  in  the  land  of  Unculpsalm  Ethiopians, 
which  the  men  of  Unculpsalm  called  Niggahs.  And 
their  skins  were  black,  and  for  hair  they  had  wool,  and 
their  shins  bent  out  forward  and  their  heels  thrust  out 
backward  ; and  their  ill-savor  went  up. 

Wherefore  the  forefathers  of  the  men  of  Unculpsalm 


RICHARD  GRANT  WHITE 


235 


had  made  slaves  of  the  Niggahs,  and  bought  them  and 
sold  them  like  cattle. 

But  so  it  was  that  when  the  people  of  Unculpsalm 
made  themselves  into  one  nation,  the  men  of  the  North 
said,  We  will  no  longer  buy  and  sell  the  Niggahs,  but 
will  set  them  free  ; neither  shall  more  be  brought  from 
Ethiopia  for  slaves  unto  this  land. 

And  the  men  of  the  South  answered  and  said,  We  will 
buy  and  sell  our  Niggahs  ; and  moreover  we  will  beat 
them  with  stripes,  and  they  shall  be  our  hewers  of  wood 
and  drawers  of  water  forever  ; and  when  our  Niggahs 
flee  into  your  provinces  ye  shall  give  them  to  us,  every 
man  his  Niggah  ; and  after  a time  there  shall  no  more 
be  brought  from  Ethiopia,  as  ye  say.  And  this  shall  be 
a part  of  the  Great  Covenant. 

And  it  was  a covenant  between  the  men  of  the  North 
and  the  men  of  the  South. 

And  it  came  to  pass  that  thereafter  the  men  of  the 
South  and  the  Dimmichrats  of  the  North  and  the  Pah- 
dees  gave  themselves  night  and  day  to  the  preservation 
of  this  covenant  about  the  Niggahs. 

And  the  Niggahs  increased  and  multiplied  till  they 
darkened  all  the  land  of  the  South.  And  certain  of  the 
men  of  Unculpsalm  who  dwelt  in  the  South  took  their 
women  for  concubines  and  went  in  unto  them,  and  be- 
gat of  them  sons  and  daughters.  And  they  bought  and 
sold  their  sons  and  daughters,  even  the  fruit  of  their 
loins  ; and  beat  them  with  stripes,  and  made  them  hew- 
ers of  wood  and  drawers  of  water. 

For  they  said,  Are  not  these  Niggahs  our  Niggahs  ? 
Yea,  even  more  than  the  other  Niggahs  ? For  the  other 
Niggahs  we  bought,  or  our  fathers,  with  money  ; but 
these,  are  they  not  flesh  of  our  flesh,  and  blood  of  our 
blood,  and  bone  of  our  bone  ; and  shall  we  not  do  what 
we  will  with  our  own  ? 

But  there  arose  men  in  the  northern  provinces  of 
Unculpsalm  and  in  the  countries  beyond  the  great  sea, 
iniquitous  men,  saying,  Man’s  blood  cannot  be  bought 
with  money  ; foolish  men,  saying,  Though  the  Niggah’s 
skin  be  black,  and  his  hair  woolly,  and  his  shins  like 
unto  cucumbers,  and  his  heels  thrusting  out  backward, 
and  though  he  has  an  ill-savor  not  to  be  endured  by 


RICKARD  GRANT  WHITE 


2$6 

those  who  get  not  children  of  Niggah  women,  yet  Is  he 
a man ; men  of  Belial,  which  said,  All  things  whatso- 
ever ye  would  that  men  should  do  to  you,  do  ye  even 
so  to  them  ; for  this  is  the  law  and  the  prophets. 

And  the  slaves  were  for  a reproach  throughout  all 
the  world  unto  the  men  of  the  South,  and  even  unto 
the  whole  land  of  Unculpsalm,  But  by  reason  of  the 
Great  Covenant  and  the  laws  of  the  provinces,  the  men 
of  the  North  had  naught  to  do  in  this  matter. 

But  the  men  of  the  South  which  had  Niggahs  (for 
there  were  multitudes  which  were  of  the  tribe  of  Meen- 
ouites  which  had  no  Niggahs,  and  they  were  poor  and 
oppressed)  heeded  it  not ; for  they  were  a stiff-necked 
generation.  And  they  said,  We  will  not  let  our  Nig- 
gahs go  free  ; for  they  are  even  as  our  horses  and  our 
sheep,  our  swine  and  our  oxen  ; and  we  will  beat  them 
and  slay  them  and  sell  them,  and  beget  children  of  them, 
and  no  man  shall  gainsay  us.  We  stand  by  the  Great 
Covenant. 

Moreover  we  are  Tshivulree, 

Now  to  be  of  the  Tshivulree  was  the  chief  boast  among 
the  men  of  the  South,  because  it  had  been  a great  name 
upon  the  earth.  For  of  olden  time  he  who  was  of  the 
Tshivulree  was  bound  by  an  oath  to  defend  the  weak 
and  succor  the  oppressed,  yea,  even  though  he  gave  his 
life  for  them.  But  among  the  men  of  the  South  he  only 
was  of  the  Tshivulree  who  ate  his  bread  in  the  sweat  of 
another’s  face,  who  robbed  the  laborer  of  his  hire,  who 
oppressed  the  weak,  and  set  his  foot  upon  the  neck  of 
the  lowly,  and  who  sold  from  the  mother  the  fruit  of 
her  womb  and  the  nursling  of  her  bosom.  Wherefore 
the  name  of  Tshivulree  stank  in  the  nostrils  of  all  na- 
tions. 

For  they  were  in  the  darkness  of  a false  dispensation, 
and  had  not  yet  learned  the  mystery  of  the  new  gospel 
of  peace. 

And  when  the  Tshivulree  found  within  their  borders 
those  men  of  the  North,  iniquitous  men  which  said  that 
man’s  blood  cannot  be  bought,  and  men  of  Belial  which 
said,  Do  ye  unto  all  men  as  ye  would  have  all  men  do 
unto  you,  they  seized  upon  them  and  beat  them  with 
many  stripes,  and  hanged  them  upon  trees,  and  roasted 


RICHARD  GRANT  WHITT 


?V7 

them  with  fire,  and  poured  hot  pitch  upon  them,  and 
rode  them  upon  sharp  beams,  very  grievous  to  bestride, 
and  persecuted  them  even  as  it  was  fitting  such  pestL 
lent  fellows  should  be  persecuted. 

And  they  said  unto  the  men  of  the  North,  Cease  ye 
now  to  send  among  us  these  men  of  Belial  preaching 
iniquity,  cease  also  to  listen  unto  them  yourselves,  and 
respect  the  Great  Covenant,  or  we  will  destroy  this 
nation. 

Then  the  men  of  Unculpsalm  which  called  themselves 
Dimmichrats,  and  the  Pahdees,  seeing  that  the  Tshivul- 
ree  of  the  South  had  only  one  thought,  and  that  was  for 
the  Niggah,  said,  We  will  join  ourselves  unto  the  Tshiv- 
ulree,  and  we  will  have  but  one  thought  with  them,  even 
the  Niggah  ; and  we  shall  rule  the  land  of  Unculpsalm, 
and  we  shall  divide  the  spoil. 

And  they  joined  themselves  unto  the  Tshivulree  ; and 
the  Tshivulree  of  the  South,  and  the  men  of  the  North, 
which  called  themselves  Dimmichrats,  and  the  Pahdees, 
ruled  the  land  of  Unculpsalm  for  many  years  ; and  they 
divided  the  spoil.  And  they  had  but  one  thought,  even 
for  the  Niggah. 

Wherefore  he  was  '“ailed  the  everlasting  Niggah. 

And  the  Tshivulree  of  the  South  saw  that  the  men  of 
the  North  feared  their  threats  ; and  they  waxed  bolder 
and  said,  We  will  rot  only  keep  our  Niggahs  in  our  own 
provinces,  but  we  will  take  them  into  all  the  country  of 
Unculpsalm,  which  is  not  yet  divided  into  provinces. 
And  they  went  roaring  up  and  down  the  land. 

But  in  the  process  of  time  it  came  to  pass  that  the 
spirit  of  their  forefathers  appeared  among  the  men  of 
the  North,  even  the  great  spirit,  Bak  Bohn  ; and  he 
stiffened  up  the  people  mightily. 

So  that  they  said  unto  the  men  of  the  South,  Hear 
us,  our  brethren  ! We  would  live  with  you  in  peace, 
and  love  you,  and  respect  the  Great  Covenant  And 
the  Niggahs  in  your  provinces  ye  shall  keep,  and  slay, 
and  sell,  they  and  the  children  which  ye  begat  of  them, 
into  slavery,  for  bondmen  and  bondwomen  forever. 
Yours  be  the  sin  before  the  Lord,  not  ours  ; for  it  is 
your  doing,  and  we  are  not  answerable  for  it.  And 
your  Niggahs  that  flee  from  your  provinces  they  shall 


238 


RICHARD  GRANT  WHITE 


be  returned  unto  you,  according  to  the  Great  Covenant. 
Only  take  care  lest  peradventure  ye  make  captives  the 
Niggahs  of  your  provinces  which  we  have  made  free 
men.  Ye  shall  in  no  wise  take  a Niggah  of  them. 

Thus  shall  it  be  with  your  Niggahs  and  in  your  prov- 
inces, and  yours  shall  be  the  blame  forever.  But  out  of 
your  provinces,  into  the  common  land  of  Unculpsalm, 
ye  shall  not  carry  your  Niggahs  except  they  be  made 
thereby  free.  For  that  land  is  common,  and  your  laws 
and  the  statutes  of  your  provinces,  by  which  alone  ye 
make  bondmen,  run  not  in  that  land.  And  for  all  that 
is  done  in  that  land  we  must  bear  the  blame  with  you. 
For  that  land  is  common  ; and  we  share  whatever  is 
done  therein  ; and  the  power  of  this  nation  and  the 
might  of  its  banner  shall  no  longer  be  used  to  oppress 
the  lowly  and  to  fasten  the  chain  upon  the  captive. 
Keep  ye,  then,  your  bondmen  within  your  own  prov- 
inces. 

Then  the  Tshivulree  of  the  South  waxed  wroth,  and 
foamed  in  their  anger,  and  the  air  of  the  land  was  filled 
with  their  cursings  and  their  revilings.  And  certain  of 
them  which  were  men  of  blood,  and  which  were  pos- 
sessed of  devils,  and  had  difficulties,  and  slew  each  other 
with  knives  and  shooting-irons,  did  nothing  all  their 
time  but  rave  through  the  land  about  the  Niggah. — The 
New  Gospel  of  Peace . 


WHITEF1ELD,  George,  an  English  clergy- 
man and  apostle  of  Methodism,  born  at  Glouces- 
ter, England,  December  17,  1714;  died  at  New- 
buryport,  Mass.,  September  30,  1770.  At  an  early 
age,  he  was  given  to  fasting  and  to  composing 
sermons.  While  in  college  at  Oxford,  he  was  a 
friend  of  Charles  Wesley  and  one  of  the  club 
called  Methodists,  from  their  religious  habits. 
He  was  ordained  by  the  Bishop  of  Gloucester  in 
17 36,  preached  with  great  effect,  and  the  next 
year  visited  America.  Returning  to  England,  he 
went  about  holding  outdoor  meetings  and  gather- 
ing immense  crowds.  He  made  seven  voyages  to 
America,  preaching  throughout  the  colonies  with 
such  power  that  he  was  called  “the  wonder  of 
the  age ; ” as  many  as  20,000  people,  it  is  said, 
listened  to  him  on  Boston  Common.  His  few  ex- 
tant sermons,  given  extempore  and  afterward 
written  out  by  himself,  “ contain  ” he  prefaced, 
“the  sum  and  substance,”  on  which,  “according 
to  the  freedom  and  assistance  given  from  above,” 
he  had  enlarged.  Aside  from  their  earnest  spirit, 
they  do  not  seem  remarkable,  in  cold  type.  In 
doctrine  he  was  Calvinistic ; in  charity  abundant, 
as  witnessed  by  his  zeal  in  establishing  an  orphan 
asylum  at  Savannah,  Ga.  A collection  of  his 
sermons,  tracts,  and  letters  was  published  in  six 
volumes,  London,  1771 ; and  bis  journals  were 

(23 9) 


GEORGE  WHITEFIELD 


240 

printed  some  years  before  his  death.  The  follow- 
ing extract  is  from  a volume  of  fifteen  sermons 
(1740). 

CHRIST  OUR  REDEMPTION. 

The  glories  of  the  upper  world  crowd  in  so  fast  upon 
my  soul  that  I am  lost  in  the  contemplation  of  them. 
Brethren,  the  redemption  spoken  of  is  unutterable  ; we 
cannot  here  find  it  out — eye  hath  not  seen,  nor  ear 
heard,  nor  has  it  entered  into  the  hearts  of  the  most 
holy  men  living,  to  conceive  how  great  it  is.  Were  I to 
entertain  you  whole  ages  with  an  account  of  it,  when 
you  come  to  heaven,  you  must  say  with  Sheba,  Not  half, 
no,  not  one  thousandth  part  was  told  us.  All  we  can 
do  here  is  to  go  to  Mount  Pisgah,  and  by  the  eye  of 
faith,  take  a distant  view  of  the  promised  land.  We 
may  see  it,  as  Abraham  did  Christ,  afar  off,  and  rejoice 
in  it,  but  here  we  only  know  in  part.  Blessed  be  God, 
there  is  a time  coming  when  we  shall  know  God,  even 
as  we  are  known,  and  God  will  be  all  in  all.  “ Lord 

Jesus,  accomplish  the  number  of  thine  elect ! Lord 
esus,  hasten  thy  kingdom.'* 

And  now,  where  are  the  scoffers  of  these  last  days, 
who  count  the  lives  of  Christians  madness,  and  their 
end  to  be  without  honor  ? Were  your  eyes  open,  and 
your  sense  to  discern  spiritual  things,  you  would  not 
speak  all  manner  of  evil  against  the  children  of  God, 
but  you  would  esteem  them  the  excellent  ones  of  the 
earth,  and  envy  their  happiness  ; your  souls  would  hun- 
ger and  thirst  after  it — you  also  would  become  fools  for 
Christ’s  sake.  You  boast  of  wisdom  ; so  did  the  philos- 
ophers of  Corinth  ; but  your  wisdom  is  the  foolishness 
of  folly  in  the  sight  of  God.  What  does  your  wisdom 
avail  you,  if  it  does  not  make  you  wise  unto  salvation  > 
Can  you,  with  all  your  wisdom,  propose  a more  consist- 
ent scheme  to  build  your  salvation  on,  than  what  has 
been  laid  down  before  you?  Can  you,  with  all  the 
strength  of  natural  reason,  find  out  a better  way  of  ac- 
ceptance with  God,  than  by  the  righteousness  of  the 
Lord  Jesus  Christ  ? Is  it  right  to  think  your  own 
works  can  in  any  measure  deserve  or  procure  it?  If 
aot,  why  will  you  not  believe  in  Him  > Why  will  vou  not 


GEORGE  IV II 7 1 E FIELD 


241 


submit  to  His  righteousness  ? Can  you  deny  that  you 
are  fallen  creatures  ? Do  you  not  find  that  you  are  full 
of  disorders,  and  that  these  disorders  make  you  un- 
happy ? Do  you  not  find  that  you  cannot  change  your 
own  hearts  ? Have  you  not  resolved  many  and  many 
a time,  and  have  not  your  corruptions  yet  dominion 
over  you  ? Are  you  not  bond-slaves  to  your  lusts,  and 
led  caDtive  by  the  devil  at  his  will  ? Why,  then,  will  you 
not  come  to  Christ  for  sanctification  ? Do  you  not  de- 
sire to  die  the  death  of  the  righteous,  and  that  your 
future  state  may  be  like  theirs?  I am  persuaded  you 
cannot  bear  the  thought  of  being  annihilated,  much 
less  of  being  miserable  forever.  Whatever  you  may 
pretend,  if  you  speak  truth,  you  must  confess,  that  con- 
science breaks  in  upon  you  in  your  more  sober  intervals 
whether  you  will  or  not,  and  even  constrains  you  to 
believe  that  hell  is  no  painted  fire.  And  why,  then,  will 
you  not  come  to  Christ  ? He  alone  can  procure  you 
everlasting  redemption.  Haste,  haste  away  to  Him, 
poor,  beguiled  sinners.  You  lack  wisdom,  ask  it  of 
Christ ; who  knows  but  He  may  give  it  you  ? He  is 
able.  For  He  is  the  wisdom  of  the  Father.  He  is  that 
wisdom  which  was  from  everlasting  ; you  have  no  right- 
eousness ; away  to  Christ ; He  is  the  end  of  the  law  for 
righteousness  to  every  one  that  believeth.  You  are 
unholy,  fly  to  the  Lord  Jesus  ; He  is  full  of  grace  and 
truth,  and  of  His  fulness  all  may  receive  that  believe  in 
Him.  You  are  afraid  to  die,  let  this  drive  you  to  Christ ; 
Fie  has  the  keys  of  death  and  hell.  In  Him  is  plenteous 
redemption  ; He  alone  can  open  the  door  which  leads 
to  everlasting  life.  Let  not  the  deceived  reasoner 
boast  any  longer  of  his  pretended  reason.  Whatever 
you  may  think,  it  is  the  most  unreasonable  thing  in  the 
world,  not  to  believe  on  Jesus  Christ,  Whom  God  hath 
sent.  Why,  why  will  you  die  ? Why  will  you  not  come 
unto  Him,  that  you  may  have  life  ? Oh,  every  one  that 
thirsteth,  come  unto  the  waters  of  life  and  drink  freely. 
Come,  buy  without  money  and  without  price.  Were 
these  blessed  privileges  in  the  text  to  be  purchased  by 
money,  you  might  say,  We  are  poor  and  cannot  buy. 
Or  if  they  were  to  be  conferred  only  on  sinners  of  such 
a rank  or  degree,  then  you  might  say,  How  can  such 


GEORGE  WHITEFIELD 


sinners  as  we  expect  to  be  so  highly  favored  ? But  they 
are  to  be  freely  given  of  God  to  the  worst  of  sinners — 
to  us,  says  the  apostle — to  me  a persecutor  to  you 
Corinthians,  who  were  unclean,  drunkards,  covetous 
persons,  idolaters.  Therefore  each  poor  sinner  may 
say  then,  Why  not  unto  me  ? Has  Christ  but  one  bless- 
ing? What  if  He  has  blessed  millions,  by  turning  them 
away  from  their  iniquities  ? yet  He  still  continues  the 
same.  He  lives  forever  to  make  intercession,  and 
therefore  will  bless  you,  even  you  also,  though,  Esau- 
like,  you  have  been  profane,  and  hitherto  despised  your 
heavenly  Father’s  birthright.  Even  now,  if  you  believe, 
Christ  will  be  made  unto  you  of  God,  wisdom , righteous- 
ness, sanctification , and  redemption. 

But  I must  turn  again  to  believers,  for  whose  instruc- 
tion, as  I observed  before,  this  discourse  was  partic- 
ularly intended.  You  see,  brethren,  partakers  of  the 
heavenly  calling,  what  great  blessings  are  treasured  up 
for  you  in  Jesus  Christ,  your  Head,  and  what  you  are 
entitled  to  by  believing  on  His  name  ; take  heed,  there- 
fore, that  ye  walk  worthy  of  the  vocation  wherewith  ye 
are  called.  Think  often  how  highly  you  are  favored, 
and  remember  you  have  not  chosen  Christ,  but  Christ 
hath  chosen  you.  Put  on  (as  the  elect  of  God)  humble- 
ness of  mind,  and  glory,  but  oh,  let  it  be  only  in  the 
Lord.  For  you  have  nothing  but  what  you  have  re- 
ceived of  God  ; by  nature  you  were  as  foolish,  as  legal, 
as  unholy,  and  in  as  damnable  a condition  as  others  ; 
be  pitiful  therefore,  be  courteous,  and,  as  santification 
is  a progressive  work,  beware  of  thinking  you  have  al 
ready  attained.  Let  him  that  is  holy,  be  holy  still, 
knowing  that  he  who  is  most  pure  in  heart  shall  here- 
after enjoy  the  clearest  vision  of  God.  Let  indwelling 
sin  be  your  daily  burden,  and  not  only  bewail  and  lament, 
but  see  that  you  subdue  it  daily  by  the  power  of  divine 
grace,  and  look  up  to  Jesus  continually  to  be  the 
Finisher  as  well  as  the  Author  of  your  faith. — Sermon 
on  i.  Cor . jo. 


WHITMAN,  Sarah  Helen,  an  American 
poet,  born  at  Providence,  R.  I.,  in  1803;  died 
there,  June  27,  1878.  She  was  the  daughter  of 
Nicholas  Power,  and  in  1828  was  married  to  John 
W.  Whitman,  a lawyer  of  Boston.  He  died  in 
1833,  and  in  1848  she  was  betrothed  to  Edgar 
Allan  Poe,  but  the  engagement  was  broken  off 
on  the  eve  of  their  intended  marriage.  Mrs. 
Whitman  published  a book  entitled  Edgar  Poe  mid 
His  Critics  (i860).  Two  collections  of  her  poems 
nave  been  published,  Hours  of  Life , and  Other 
Poems  (1843),  and  Poems  (1870). 

“ Mrs.  Whitman's  volume  of  poems,”  says 
Duyckinck,  “ is  a book  of  a rare,  passionate  beauty, 
marked  by  fine  mental  characteristics.  The  chief 
poem,  Hours  of  Life,  is  a picture  of  the  soul  in  its 
progress  though  time,  and  its  search  out  of  dis- 
appointment and  experience  for  peace  and  secur- 
ity. Its  learned,  philosophical  spirit  is  not  less 
remarkable  than  its  tenderness  and  spiritual  mel- 
ody.” 

A NIGHT  IN  AUGUST. 

How  softly  comes  the  summer  wind 
At  evening  o’er  the  hill, 

Forever  murmuring  of  thee 

When  the  busy  crowds  are  still ; 

The  way-side  flowers  seem  to  guess 
And  whisper  of  my  happiness. 

Vol.  XX1V.-H9-  434^.— 


244 


SARAH  HELEN  WHITMAN 


The  jasmine  twines  her  snowy  stars 
Into  a fairer  wreath  ; 

The  lily  lifts  her  proud  tiars 
More  royally  beneath  ; 

The  snow-drop  with  her  fairy  bells, 

In  silver  time,  the  story  tells. 

Through  all  the  dusk  and  dewy  hours, 

The  banded  stars  above 
Are  singing,  in  their  airy  towers, 

The  melodies  of  love  ; 

And  clouds  of  shadowy  silver  fly 
All  night,  like  doves,  athwart  the  sky. 

Fair  Dian  lulls  the  throbbing  stars 
Into  Elysian  dreams  ; 

And,  rippling  through  my  latticed  bars, 

Her  brooding  glory  streams 
Around  me,  like  the  golden  shower 
That  reigned  through  Danae’s  guarded  tower. 

And  when  the  waning  moon  doth  glide 
Into  the  valleys  gray  ; 

When,  like  the  music  of  a dream 
The  night-wind  dies  away  ; 

When  all  the  wayside  flowers  have  furled 
Their  wings  with  morning  dews  impearled, 

A low,  bewildering  melody 

Seems  murmuring  in  my  ear — 

Tones  such  as  in  the  twilight  wood 
The  aspen  thrills  to  hear, 

When  Faunus  slumbers  on  the  hill, 

And  all  the  entranced  boughs  are  stilL 

THE  PORTRAIT. 

After  long  years  l raised  th  folds  concealing 
That  face,  magnetic  as  the  morning’s  beam  : 
While  slumbering  memory  thriiled  at  its  revealing 
Like  Memnon  wakening  from  his  marble  dream. 


SARAH  HELEN  WHITMAN 


345 


Again  I saw  the  brow’s  translucent  pallor, 

The  dark  hair  floating  o’er  it  like  a plume  ; 

The  sweet,  imperious  mouth,  whose  haughty  valor 
Defied  all  portents  of  impending  doom. 

Eyes  planet-calm,  with  something  in  their  vision 
That  seemed  not  of  earth’s  mortal  mixture  born, 
Strange,  mythic  faiths  and  fantasies  Elysian, 

And  far,  sweet  dreams  of  “ faery  lands  forlorn.” 

Unfathomable  eyes  that  held  the  sorrow 
Of  vanished  ages  in  their  shadowy  deeps, 

Lit  by  that  prescience  of  a heavenly  morrow 
Which  in  high  hearts  the  immortal  spirit  keeps. 

Oft  has  that  pale,  poetic  presence  haunted 
My  lonely  musings  at  the  twilight  hour, 
Transforming  the  dull  earth-life  it  enchanted, 

With  marvel  and  with  mystery  and  with  power. 

Oft  have  I heard  the  sullen  sea-wind  moaning 
Its  dirge-like  requiems  on  the  lonely  shore, 

Or  listening  to  the  autumn  woods  intoning 
The  wild,  sweet  legend  of  the  lost  Lenore  ; 

Oft  in  some  ashen  evening  of  October, 

Have  stood  entranced  beside  a mouldering  tomb 
Hard  by  that  visionary  lake  of  Auber, 

Where  sleeps  the  shrouded  form  of  Ulalume  ; 

Oft  in  chill,  star-lit  nights  have  heard  the  chiming 
Of  far-off,  mellow  bells  on  the  keen  air, 

And  felt  their  molten-golden  music  timing 
To  the  heart’s  pulses,  answering  unaware. 

Sweet,  mournful  eyes,  long  closed  upon  earth’s  sorrow. 
Sleep  restfully  after  life's  fevered  dream  ! 

Sleep,  wayward  heart ! till  on  some  cool,  bright  morrow. 
Thy  soul,  refreshed,  shall  bathe  in  morning’s  beam. 

Though  cloud  and  sorrow  rest  upon  thy  story, 

And  rude  hands  lift  the  drapery  of  thy  pall, 

Time,  as  a birthright,  shall  restore  to  glory, 

And  Heaven  rekindle  all  the  stars  that  fall. 


WHITMAN,  Walt,  an  American  poet,  born 
at  West  Hills,  Long  Island,  N.  Y.,  May  31,  1819; 
died  at  Camden,  N.  J.,  March  26,  1892.  He  was 
educated  at  the  public  schools  of  Brooklyn  and 
New  York,  and  subsequently  followed  various 
occupations ; among  which  were  those  of  printer, 
teacher,  carpenter,  and  journalist,  making  in  the 
meantime  extended  tours  in  the  United  States 
and  Canada.  During  the  greater  part  of  the  civil 
war  he  served  as  a volunteer  nurse  in  the  army 
hospitals ; and  at  its  close  was  appointed  a Gov- 
ernment clerk  at  Washington.  In  1873  he  had  a 
severe  paralytic  attack.  This  was  followed  by 
others,  which  crippled  him  physically,  and  he  took 
up  his  residence  at  Camden,  N.  J.  His  first  not- 
able work,  Leaves  of  Grass , was  published  in  1855. 
It  was  subsequently  much  enlarged  by  successive 
additions,  up  to  1881,  when  he  pronounced  it 
“ now  finished  to  the  end  of  its  opportunities  and 
powers.”  Besides  this,  he  wrote  many  poems  for 
periodicals,  some  of  which  have  been  collected 
into  volumes,  among  which  are  Drum- Taps  (1865) ; 
Two  Rivulets  (1873);  Specimen  Days  and  Collect 
(1883);  November  Boughs  (1885) ; Sands  at  Seventy 
(1888);  Good-bye , My  Fancy  (1891),  and  Autobio - 
graphia  (1892),  his  personal  history  gleaned  from 
his  prose  writings.  He  also  put  forth  in  1870  a 
volume  of  prose  essays,  entitled  Democratic  Vistas , 


A * ; 1 

'!* MAN,  Walt,  an  Am 

an  poet,  born 

iit  V>  >-  * 

r Hills,  Long  Island,  N. 

Vm  May  31,  1819; 

C urn  den,  N.  J.,  March 

26,  1892.  He  was 

: at  the  public  schools 

of  Brooklyn  and 

N-  w \ 

and  subsequently 

tU  ! lowed  various 

occup^i 

; among  which  wer 

? those  of  printer. 

. i - neater,  and  journal i 

making  in  the 

flncn!  P. 

• e tended  tours  in  t 

. , United  States 

and  ( 

During  the  great x 

t of  the  civil 

war  he 

> d*as  a volunteer  r 

>.i  in  the  u * • i v 

iu  ; e-  A at  its  close  was 

&X:{  ■ a Crov» 

era?r 

; drrk  at  Washington. 

It  r had  a 

s<  •. 

. a attack.  This 

was  followed  by 

O’ 

up 

WALT  WHITMAN.  took 

Photogravure—  Prom  a phou, graph. 

ri  > ' 

Specially  engraved  for  the  Ridpath  Library 

rcces  ive 

add  u 

. up  to  1 88 1,  when  \ 

v pronounced  it 

i(  »,  , , v,  ~ *4 

; to  the  end  of  its 

opportunities  and 

' 

U s this,  he  wr  < a 

uany  poems  for 

perio  i 

: ai • . some  of  which  h a 

vf  been  collected 

into  vol 

unurs  onong  which  are 

Drum-  Taps  ( 1 865) ; 

Two  K 

izmUi,  873) ; Specimen 

Days  and  Colled 

0*8-- 

No:  - • Boughs  (188: ) ; 

Sands  at  Sr-  entv 

(is- 

’01),  and  A uteb u 

graft 

IjBq  personal 

cry  gleaned  from 

his  pro 

n He  also  put  forth  in  1870  a 

volume 

0;  • c essays,  entitled 

Democratic  Vistas , 

Iff!  UBItfiV 
OF  TBE 

tt MWEiUllY  W ttMHSl* 


WALT  WHITMAN 


247 


which  was  republished  in  1888,  with  a new  Preface. 
His  Complete  Poems  and  Prose  appeared  in  one  vol- 
ume in  the  same  year.  Mr.  Whitman’s  poems  are 
marked  by  numerous  idiosyncrasies  in  regard  to 
the  choice  of  topics,  and  to  rhythmical  form,  which 
have  furnished  occasion  for  much  criticism,  favor- 
able and  unfavorable. 

IN  ALL,  MYSELF. 

I am  the  poet  of  the  Body  and  I am  the  poet  of  the 
Soul, 

The  pleasures  of  heaven  are  with  me,  and  the  pains  of 
hell  are  with  me  ; 

The  first  I graft  upon  myself,  the  latter  I translate  into 
a new  tongue. 

I am  the  poet  of  the  woman  the  same  as  the  man, 

And  I say  it  is  as  great  to  be  a woman  as  to  be  a man. 
And  I say  there  is  nothing  greater  than  the  mother  of 
men. 

I chant  the  chant  of  dilation  or  pride, 

We  have  had  ducking  and  deprecation  about  enough, 

I show  that  size  is  only  development. 

Have  you  outstript  the  rest  ? are  you  the  President  ? 

It  is  a trifle,  they  will  more  than  arrive  there,  every  one, 
and  still  pass  on. 

I am  he  that  walks  with  the  tender  and  growing  night, 
I call  to  the  earth  and  sea,  half-held  by  the  night, 

Press  close,  bare-bosonTd  night — press  close,  magnetic, 
nourishing  night ! 

Night  of  South  winds — night  of  the  large,  few  stars ! 
Still,  nodding  night — mad,  naked  summer  night. 

Smile,  O voluptuous,  cooi-breathed  earth ! 

Earth  of  the  slumbering  and  liquid  trees ! 

Earth  of  departed  sunset — earth  of  the  mountains  mit* 
ty-topt  f 


248  WALT  WHITMAN 

Earth  of  the  vitreous  pour  of  the  ful!  moon  just  tinged 
with  blue  ! 

Earth  of  shine  and  dark  mottling  the  tide  of  the  river  ! 

Earth  of  the  limpid  gray  of  clouds  brighter  and  clearer 
for  my  sake  ! 

Far -swooping,  elbow’d  earth  — rich,  apple  - blossom’d 
earth  ! 

Smile,  for  your  lover  comes. 

Prodigal,  you  have  given  me  love— -therefore  to  you  I 
give  love  ! 

Oh,  unspeakable,  passionate  love. 

THE  PiEAN  OF  JOY. 

Now,  trumpeter  1 for  thy  close, 

Vouchsafe  a higher  strain  than  any  yet ; 

Sing  to  my  soul  !— -renew  its  languishing  faith  and  hope  ; 

Rouse  up  my  slow  belief — give  me  some  vision  of  the 
future  ; 

Give  me,  for  once,  its  prophecy  and  joy. 

O glad,  exulting,  culminating  song ! 

A vigor  more  than  earth’s  is  in  thy  notes  I 

Marches  of  victory — man  disenthralled— the  conqueror 
at  last ! 

Hymns  to  the  universal  God  from  universal  Man — all  joy ! 

A reborn  race  appears— a perfect  world — all  joy  l 

Women  and  men  in  wisdom,  innocence,  and  health— all 
joy! 

Riotous,  laughing  bacchanals,  filled  with  joy  ! 

War,  sorrowing,  suffering  gone — the  rank  earth  purged 
— nothing  but  joy  left ! 

The  ocean  filled  with  joy— the  atmosphere  all  joy  ! 

Joy  ! joy  ! in  freedom,  worship,  love  ! Joy  in  the  ecstasy 
of  life  ! 

Enough  to  merely  be ! Enough  to  breathe ! 

Joy  ! joy ! all  over  joy  1 

THE  REALITIES  OF  LIFE  AND  DEATH. 

Great  is  Life,  real  and  mystical,  wherever  and  whoever— 

Great  is  Death — sure  as  Life  holds  all  parts  together, 
Death  holds  all  parts  together  ; 


WALT  WHITMAN 


Death  has  Just  as  much  purpose  as  Life  ha®  : 

Do  you  enjoy  what  Life  confers  ? 

You  shall  enjoy  what  Death  confers. 

I do  not  understand  the  realities  of  Death,  but  I know 
that  they  are  great : 

I do  not  understand  the  least  reality  of  Life — how  then 
can  I understand  the  realities  of  Death  ? 

UPON  DEATH. 

0 Death ! 

Oh,  the  beautiful  touch  of  Death,  soothing  and  benumb- 
ing a few  moments,  for  reasons  ! 

Oh,  that  of  myself,  discharging  my  excrementitious 
body,  to  be  burned,  or  reduced  to  powder,  or 
buried, 

My  real  body  doubtless  left  to  me  for  other  spheres, 

My  voided  body,  nothing  more  to  me,  returning  to  the 
purifications,  further  offices,  eternal  uses  of  the 
earth  ! 

IMMORTALITY. 

Whoever  you  are ! you  are  he  or  she  for  whom  the 
earth  is  solid  and  liquid  ; 

You  are  he  or  she  for  whom  the  sun  and  the  moon  hang 
in  the  sky ; 

For  none  more  than  you  are  the  present  and  the  past ; 

For  none  more  than  you  is  immortality ! 

Each  man  to  himself,  and  each  woman  to  herself,  is  the 
word  of  the  past  and  present,  and  the  word  of 
immortality  ; 

No  one  can  acquire  for  another — not  one  ! 

No  one  can  grow  for  another — not  one  ! 

I HEAR  AMERICA  SINGING. 

1 hear  America  singing,  the  varied  carols  I hear, 

Those  of  mechanic  singing  his  as  it  should  be,  blithe 

and  strong, 

The  carpenter  singing  his  as  he  measures  his  plank  or 
beam, 

The  mason  singing  his  as  he  makes  ready  for  work,  or 
leaves  off  work, 


250 


WALT  WHITMAN 


The  boatman  singing  what  belongs  to  him  in  his  boat, 
the  deck-hand  singing  on  the  steam-boat  deck, 
The  shoemaker  singing  as  he  sits  on  his  bench,  the  hat- 
ter singing  as  he  stands, 

The  wood-cutter’s  song,  the  ploughboy’s  on  his  way  in 
the  morning,  or  at  noon  intermission  or  at  sun- 
down, 

The  delicious  singing  of  the  mother,  or  of  the  young 
wife  at  work,  or  of  the  girl  sewing  or  washing, 
Each  singing  what  belongs  to  him  or  her  and  to  none 
else, 

The  day  what  belongs  to  the  day — at  night  the  party  of 
young  fellows,  robust,  friendly, 

Singing  with  melodious  mouths  their  strong,  melodious 
songs. 

OLD  IRELAND. 

Far  hence  amid  an  isle  of  wondrous  beauty. 

Crouching  over  a grave  an  ancient,  sorrowful  mother, 
Once  a queen,  now  lean  and  tatter’d,  seated  on  the 
ground, 

Her  old,  white  hair  drooping,  dishevel’d,  round  her 
shoulders, 

At  her  feet,  fallen,  an  unused  royal  harp, 

Long  silent,  she,  too,  long  silent,  mourning  her  shroud- 
ed hope  and  heir, 

Of  all  the  earth  most  full  of  sorrow  because  most  full 
of  love. 

Yet  a word,  ancient  mother, 

You  need  crouch  there  no  longer  on  the  cold  ground, 
with  forehead  between  your  knees, 

Oh,  you  need  not  sit  there  veil’d  in  your  old,  white  hair 
so  dishevel’d, 

For  know  you  the  one  you  mourn  is  not  in  that  grave. 
It  was  an  illusion,  the  son  you  love  was  not  really  dead, 
The  Lord  is  not  dead,  He  is  risen  again,  young  and 
strong,  in  another  country, 

What  you  wept  for  was  translated,  pass’d  from  the 
grave. 

The  winds  favor’d  and  the  sea  sail’d  it, 

And  now  with  rosy  and  new  blood, 

Moves  to-day  in  a new  country. 


WALT  WHITMAN* 


25* 


YOUTH,  DAY,  OLD  AGE,  AND  NIGHT. 

Youth,  large,  lusty,  loving — youth  full  of  grace,  force, 
fascination, 

Do  you  know  that  Old  Age  may  come  after  you  with 
equal  grace,  force,  fascination  ? 

Day,  full-blown  and  splendid — day  of  the  immense  sun — 
action,  ambition,  laughter, 

The  Night  follows  close  with  millions  of  suns,  and  sleep, 
and  restoring  darkness. 

DAREST  THOU  NOW,  O SOUL? 

Darest  thou  now,  O soul, 

Walk  out  with  me  toward  the  unknown  region, 

Where  neither  ground  is  for  the  feet  nor  any  path  to 
follow  ? 

No  map  there,  nor  guide, 

Nor  voice  sounding,  nor  touch  of  human  hand, 

Nor  face  with  blooming  flesh,  nor  lips  nor  eyes  are  in 
that  land. 

I know  it  not,  O soul, 

Nor  dost  thou — all  is  a blank  before  us, 

All  waits  undream’d  of  in  that  region,  that  inaccessible 
land. 

Till  when  the  ties  loosen, 

All  but  the  ties  eternal,  Time  and  Space, 

Nor  darkness,  gravitation,  sense,  nor  any  bounds  bound- 
ing us. 

Then  we  burst  forth,  we  float, 

In  Time  and  Space,  O soul,  prepared  for  them, 

Equal,  equipt  at  last  (O  joy  ! O fruit  of  all !)  them  to 
fulfil,  O soul. 

WHISPERS  OF  HEAVENLY  DEATH. 

Whispers  of  heavenly  death  murmur'd  I hear, 
Labial  gossip  of  night,  sibilant  chorals- 


252 


WALT  WHITMAN' 


Footsteps  gently  ascending,  mystical  breeze*  wafted 
soft  and  low, 

Ripples  of  unseen  rivers,  tides  of  a current  flowing,  for- 
ever flowing, 

(Or  is  it  the  plashing  of  tears  ? the  measureless  waters 
of  human  tears  ?) 

I see,  just  see  skyward,  great  cloud-masses. 

Mournfully,  slowly  they  roll,  silently  swelling  and  mix- 
ing. 

With  at  times  a half-dimm’d,  sadden’d,  far-off  star 

Appearing  and  disappearing. 

(Some  parturition,  rather,  some  solemn,  immortal  birth  ; 

On  the  frontiers,  to  eyes  impenetrable, 

Some  soul  is  passing  over.) 


TO  THE  MAN-OF-WAR  BIRD. 

Thou  who  hast  slept  all  night  upon  the  storm, 

Waking  renew’d  on  thy  prodigious  pinions 
(Burst  the  wild  storm  ? above  it  thou  ascended'st, 

And  rested  on  the  sky,  thy  slave  that  cradled  thee). 
Now  a blue  point,  far,  far  in  heaven  floating, 

As  to  the  light  emerging  here  on  deck  I watch  thee 
(Myself  a speck,  a point  on  the  world’s  floating  vast). 
Far,  far  at  sea, 

After  the  night’s  fierce  drifts  have  strewn  the  shore 
with  wrecks, 

With  reappearing  day  as  now  so  happy  and  serene, 

The  rosy  and  elastic  dawn,  the  flashing  sun, 

The  limpid  spread  of  air  cerulean, 

Thou  also  reappearer.t. 

Thou  born  to  match  the  gale  (thou  art  all  wings), 

To  cope  with  heaven  and  earth  and  sea  and  hurricane, 
Thou  ship  of  air  that  never  furl'st  thy  sails, 

Days,  even  weeks,  untired  and  onward,  through  space’s 
realms  gyrating. 

At  dusk  that  look'st  on  Senegal,  at  morn  America, 
That  sport  st  amid  the  lightning-flash  and  thunder- 
cloud, 

In  them,  in  thy  experiences,  hadst  thou  ray  soul. 

What  ioys  ! what  joys  were  thine  l 


IV ALT  WHITMAN 


TO  THOSE  WHO’VE  FAIL’D. 

To  those  who’ve  fail’d,  in  aspiration  vast, 

To  unnam’d  soldiers  fallen  in  front  on  the  lead. 

To  calm,  devoted  engineers — to  over-ardent  travellers 
— to  pilots  on  their  ships, 

To  many  a lofty  song  and  picture  without  recognition 
— I’d  rear  a laurel-covered  monument, 

High,  high  above  the  rest — to  all  cut  off  before  their 
time, 

Possess’d  by  some  strange  spirit  of  fire, 

Quench’d  by  an  early  death. 

DIRGE  FOR  ABRAHAM  LINCOLN. 

O captain  ! my  captain  ! our  fearful  trip  is  done  ; 

The  ship  has  weathered  every  rock,  the  prize  we  sought 
is  won. 

The  port  is  near,  the  bells  I hear,  the  people  all  exult- 
ing, 

While  follow  eyes  the  steady  keel,  the  vessel  grim  and 
daring  ; 

But  O heart ! heart ! heart ! 

Leave  you  not  the  little  spot, 

Where  on  the  deck  my  captain  lies, 

Fallen  cold  and  dead. 

O captain  ! my  captain  ! rise  up  and  hear  the  bells  ; 

Rise  up — for  you  the  flag  is  flung — for  you  the  bugle 
trills  ; 

For  you  bouquets  and  ribboned  wreaths — for  you  the 
shore  a-crowding ; 

For  you  they  call,  the  swaying  mass,  their  eager  faces 
turning ; 

O captain  ! dear  father ! 

This  arm  I push  beneath  you  ; 

It  is  some  dream  that  on  the  deck 
You’ve  fallen  cold  and  dead. 

My  captain  does  not  answer,  his  lips  are  pale  and  still ; 

My  father  does  not  feel  my  arm,  he  has  no  pulse  nor 

will  ; 


5 54 


WALT  WHITMAN" 


But  the  ship,  the  ship  is  anchored  safe,  its  voyage  closed 

and  done  ; 

From  fearful  trip,  the  victor  ship  comes  in  with  object 
won. 

Exult,  O shore,  and  ring,  O bells  1 
But  I,  with  silent  tread, 

Walk  the  spot  my  captain  lies, 

Fallen  cold  and  dead. 

JOY,  SHIPMATE,  JOY  \ 

Joy,  shipmate,  joy ! 

(Pleas’d  to  my  soul  at  length  I cry^ 

Our  life  is  closed,  our  life  begins, 

The  long,  long  anchorage  we  leave, 

The  ship  is  clear  at  last,  she  leaps ! 

She  swiftly  courses  from  the  shore, 

Joy,  shipmate,  joy  1 

HEROIC  DEATHS. 

The  final  use  of  the  greatest  men  of  a Nation  is.  after 
all,  not  with  reference  to  their  deeds  in  themselves, 
or  their  direct  bearing  on  their  times  or  lands.  The 
final  use  of  a heroic-eminent  life — especially  of  a heroic- 
eminent  death — is  its  indirect  filtering  into  the  nation 
and  the  race,  and  to  give,  often  at  many  removes,  but 
unerringly,  age  after  age,  color  and  fibre  to  the  per- 
sonalism of  the  youth  and  maturity  of  that  age,  and  of 
mankind.  Then  there  is  a cement  to  the  whole  peo- 
ple, subtler,  more  underlying  than  anything  m written 
constitution,  or  courts  or  armies — namely,  the  cement 
of  a death  identified  thoroughly  with  that  people,  at  its 
head,  and  for  its  sake.  Strange,  (is  it  not  ?)  that  bat- 
tles, martyrs,  agonies,  blood,  even  assassination,  should 
so  condense— perhaps  only  really,  lastingly  condense — 
a Nationality. 

I reoeat  it — the  grand  deaths  of  the  race — the  dra- 
matic deaths  of  every  nationality — are  its  most  impor- 
tant inheritance  value — in  some  respects  beyond  its 
literature  and  art — (as  the  hero  is  beyond  his  finest 
portrait,  and  the  battle  itself  beyond  its  choicest  song 
or  epic). — Tht  Death  of  Abraham  Lincoln. 


WHITNEY,  Adeline  Dutton  Train,  an 
American  novelist,  born  in  Boston,  Mass.,  Septem- 
ber 15,  1824.  After  receiving  her  education  in 
Boston,  she  was  married  to  Seth  D.  Whitney  in 
1843.  She  has  contributed  to  magazines,  and  is 
the  author  of  Footsteps  on  the  Seas , a poem  (1857) ; 
Mother  Goose  for  Grown  Folks  (i860;  revised  ed., 
1882);  Boys  at  Chequasset  (1862);  Faith  Gartney  s 
Girlhood  (1863);  The  Gayworthys  (1865);  A Sum - 
mer  in  Leslie  Goldthwaite' s Life  (1866) ; Patience 
Strong's  Outings  (1868) ; Hitherto  (1869) ; We  Girls 
(1870);  Real  Folks  (1871);  Pansies , poems  (1872); 
The  Other  Girls  (1873) ; Sights  and  Insights  (1876)  ; 
Just  How  : a Key  to  the  Cook  Books  (1878) ; Odd  or 
Even  (1880)  ; Bonny  borough  (1885) ; Homespun  Yarns 
(1886);  Holly-Tides  (1886);  Daffodils  (1887);  Bird 
Talk  (1887);  Ascutney  Street  (1890);  A Golden 
Gossip  (1892) ; White  Memories  : Three  Poems  (1893). 

“ The  most  sympathetic  of  interpreters  of  the 
mixed  and  varied  motives  of  our  human  hearts,’* 
says  Henry  W.  Bellows  in  Old  and  New  (January 
1872),  “and  recognizing  the  infirmities  and  follies 
of  the  test,  she  never  confounds  right  and  wrong, 
nor  conceals  from  herself  the  essential  quality  of 
human  actions.  . . . There  is  a noble  severity 
in  the  moral  tone  of  this  writer  which  is  rare  and 
sanative.  She  never  allows  vice  or  folly  or  false- 
hood in  her  characters  to  escape  chastisement ; 


256  ADELINE  DUTTON  TRAIN  WHITNEY 

and  she  is  as  patient  as  Providence  in  waiting  for 
the  seeds  of  retribution  to  ripen.  . . . The 

simplicity,  naturalness,  and  exquisite  delicacy  of 
all  the  critical  moments  in  the  love-passages  of 
our  author’s  characters  do  the  greatest  honor  to 
the  insight,  purity,  and  nobility  of  her  nature. 
How  full  she  can  fill  the  shallowest  words!  How 
racy  she  can  render  the  tamest  phrases!  ” 

SUNLIGHT  AND  STARLIGHT. 

God  sets  some  souls  in  shade,  alone  ; 

They  have  no  daylight  of  their  own  : 

Only  in  lives  of  happier  ones 
They  see  the  shine  of  distant  suns. 

God  knows.  Content  thee  with  thy  night. 

Thy  greater  heave  hath  grander  light. 

To-day  is  close  ; the  hours  are  small, 

Thou  sit’st  afar,  and  hast  them  all. 

Lose  the  less  joy  that  doth  but  blind ; 

Reach  forth  a larger  bliss  to  find. 

To-day  is  brief  : the  inclusive  spheres 
Rain  raptures  of  a thousand  years. 

—Pansies. 

A VIOLET. 

God  does  not  send  us  strange  flowers  every  year. 
When  the  spring  wind  blows  o’er  the  pleasant  places, 
The  same  dear  things  lift  up  the  same  fair  faces, 

The  violet  is  here. 

It  all  comes  back  : the  odor,  grace,  and  hue  ; 

Each  sweet  relation  of  its  life  repeated  ; 

No  blank  is  left,  no  looking-for  is  cheated  ; 

It  is  the  thing  we  knew. 

So  after  the  death-winter  it  must  be. 

God  will  not  put  strange  signs  in  the  heavenly  places ; 
The  old  love  shall  look  out  from  the  old  faces. 

Veilchen  ! I shall  have  thee. 


ADELINE  DUTTON  TRAIN  WHITNEY 


257 


HALLOWEEN. 

We  hung  wedding-rings — we  had  mother’s,  and  Miss 
Elizabeth  had  brought  over  Madame  Pennington’s — by 
hairs,  and  held  them  inside  tumblers ; and  they  vi- 
brated with  our  quickening  pulses  and  swung  and 
swung,  until  they  rung  out  fairy  chimes  of  destiny 
against  the  sides.  We  floated  needles  in  a great  basin 
of  water,  and  gave  them  names,  and  watched  them 
turn  and  swim  and  draw  together— some  point  to 
pointy  some  heads  and  points,  some  joined  cosily  side 
to  side,  while  some  drifted  to  the  margin  and  clung 
there  all  alone,  and  some  got  tears  in  their  eyes,  or  an 
interfering  jostle,  and  went  down.  We  melted  lead  and 
poured  it  into  water,  and  it  took  strange  shapes,  of 
spears  and  masts  and  stars ; and  some  all  went  to 
money  ; and  one  was  a queer  little  bottle  and  pills, 
and  one  was  pencils  and  artists’  tubes,  and — really — a 
little  palette  with  a hole  in  it. 

And  then  came  the  chestnut  roasting,  before  the 
bright  red  coals.  Each  girl  put  down  a pair  ; and  I dare 
say  most  of  them  put  down  some  little  secret,  girlish 
thought  with  it.  The  ripest  nuts  burned  steadiest  and 
surest,  of  course ; but  how  could  we  tell  these  until  we 
tried  ? Some  little  crack,  or  unseen  worm-hole,  would 
keep  one  still,  while  its  companion  would  pop  off, 
away  from  it ; some  would  take  flight  together,  and 
land  in  like  manner,  without  ever  parting  company ; 
these  were  to  go  some  long  way  off ; some  never  moved 
from  where  they  began,  but  burned  up,  stupidly,  peace- 
ably, side  by  side.  Some  snapped  into  the  fire.  Some 
went  off  into  corners.  Some  glowed  beautifully,  and 
some  burned  black,  and  some  got  covered  up  with 
ashes. 

Barbara’s  pair  were  ominously  still  for  a time,  when 
all  at  once  the  larger  gave  a sort  of  unwilling  lurch, 
without  popping,  and  rolled  off  a little  way,  right  toward 
the  blaze. 

“ Gone  to  a warmer  climate,”  whispered  Leslie,  like  a 
tease.  And  then  crack  ! the  warmer  climate,  or  some- 
thing else,  sent  it  back  again,  with  a real  bound,  just  as 


258  ADELINE  DUTTON  TRAIN  WHITNEY 


Barbara’s  gave  a gentle  little  snap,  and  they  both 
dropped  quietly  down  against  the  fender  together.  . . . 

Who  would  be  bold  enough  to  try  the  looking-glass  ? 
To  go  out  alone  with  it  into  the  dark  field,  walking 
backward,  saying  the  rhyme  to  the  stars  which  if  there 
had  been  a moon  ought  by  right  to  have  been  said  to 
her  : — 

“ Round  and  round,  O stars  so  fair  ! 

Ye  travel,  and  search  out  everywhere. 

I pray  you,  sweet  stars,  now  show  to  me, 

This  night,  who  my  future  husband  shall  be  ! ** 

Somehow  we  put  it  upon  Leslie.  She  was  the  oldest ; 
we  made  that  the  reason. 

“I  wouldn’t  do  it  for  anything!  ” said  Sarah  Hobart. 
“ I heard  of  a girl  who  tried  it  once,  and  saw  a shroud  ! ” 

But  Leslie  was  full  of  fun  that  evening,  and  ready 
to  do  anything.  She  took  the  little  mirror  that  Ruth 
brought  her  from  upstairs,  put  on  a shawl,  and  we  all 
went  to  the  front  door  with  her,  to  see  her  off. 

“ Round  the  piazza,  and  down  the  bank,”  said  Bar- 
bara, “ and  backward  all  the  way.” 

So  Leslie  backed  out  of  the  door,  and  we  shut  it  upon 
her.  The  instant  after,  we  heard  a great  laugh.  Off 
the  piazza,  she  had  stepped  backward  against  two  gen- 
tlemen coming  in.  Doctor  Ingleside  was  one,  coming 
to  get  his  supper  ; the  other  was  a friend  of  his,  just  ar- 
rived in  Z “ Doctor  John  Hautayne,”  he  said,  intro- 

ducing him  by  his  full  name. — We  Girls:  a Home  Story. 


WHITNEY,  William  Dwight,  a distin- 
guished American  philologist,  born  at  North, 
ampton,  Mass.,  February  9,  1827;  died  at  New 
Haven,  Conn.,  June  7,  1894.  He  was  graduated 
at  Williams  College  in  1845,  and  studied  three 
years  in  Germany.  From  1854,  he  was  pro- 
fessor of  Sanskrit  and  comparative  philology  in 
Yale  College.  As  a Sanskrit  scholar  he  had  a 
European  reputation.  His  numerous  learned 
papers  and  books,  especially  on  the  Vedas,  need 
not  to  be  named  here.  Many  of  the  papers  are 
included  in  Oriental  and  Linguistic  Studies , three 
series  (1872-5).  Some  of  his  metrical  translations 
of  the  Vedas  occur  in  these.  Other  works  by 
him  are ; Language  and  the  Study  of  Language 
(1867) ; On  the  Material  and  Form  in  Language 
(1872);  Darwinism  and  Language  (1874) ; Life  and 
Growth  of  Language  (1875);  Logical  Consistency  in 
Views  of  Language  (1880);  Mixture  in  Language 
(1881);  French  Grammar  (1886)  ; and  Max  Muller  s 
Science  of  Language  (1893).  His  text-books,  San- 
skrit, German,  French,  and  English,  are  well 
known.  He  was  the  editor-in-chief  of  the  Century 
Dictionary . 

“ Whitney’s  life-work  shows  three  important 
lines  of  activity,”  says  Charles  Rockwell  Lanman 
in  the  Atlantic  Monthly , “ the  elaboration  of  strict- 
ly technical  works,  the  preparation  of  educational 
V0L0  XXIVo— H (259; 


26o 


WILLIAM  DWIGHT  WHITNEY 


treatises,  and  the  popular  exposition  of  scientific 
questions.  The  last  two  methods  of  public  ser- 
vice are  direct  and  immediate,  and  to  be  gainsaid 
of  none  ; yet  even  here  the  less  immediate  results 
are  doubless  the  ones  by  which  he  would  have 
set  most  store.  As  for  the  first,  some  may  incline 
to  think  the  value  of  an  edition  of  the  Vedas  or  of 
a Sanskrit  grammar — to  say  nothing  of  a Prati- 
cakhya — extremely  remote  ; they  certainly  won 
for  him  neither  money  nor  popular  applause ; and 
yet,  again,  such  are  the  very  works  in  which  we 
cannot  doubt  he  took  the  deepest  satisfaction. 
He  realized  their  fundamental  character,  knew 
that  they  were  to  play  their  part  in  unlocking  the 
treasures  of  Indian  antiquity.  . . . He  labored, 
and  other  men  shall  enter  into  his  labors.  . . . 

Breadth  and  thoroughness  are  ever  at  war  with 
each  other  in  men,  for  that  men  are  finite.  The 
gift  of  both  in  large  measure  and  at  once — this 
marks  the  man  of  genius.  That  the  gift  was 
Whitney’s  is  clear  to  anyone  who  considers  the 
versatility  of  his  mind,  the  variousness  of  his 
work,  and  the  quality  of  his  results.” 

THE  ZOROASTRIAN  RELIGION. 

By  the  testimony  of  its  own  scriptures  [the  Avesta], 
the  Iranian  religion  is  with  the  fullest  right  styled  the 
Zoroastrian  : Zoroaster  is  acknowledged  as  its  founder 
throughout  the  whole  of  the  sacred  writings  ; these  are 
hardly  more  than  a record  of  the  revelations  claimed 
to  have  been  made  to  him  by  the  supreme  divinity.  It 
is  not,  then,  a religion  which  has  grown  up  in  the  mind 
of  a whole  people,  as  the  expression  of  their  concep- 
tions of  things  supernatural ; it  has  received  its  form 
in  the  mind  of  an  individual ; it  has  been  inculcated  and 


WILLIAM  DWIGHT  WHITNEY 


261 


taught  by  a single  sage  and  thinker.  Yet  such  a re- 
ligion is  not  wont  to  be  an  entirely  new  creation. 

We  are  able,  by  the  aid  of  the  Indian  Vedas,  to  trace 
out  with  some  distinctness  the  form  of  the  original 
Aryan  faith,  held  before  the  separation  of  the  Indian 
and  Persian  nations.  It  was  an  almost  pure  nature-re- 
ligion, a worship  of  the  powers  conceived  to  be  the 
producers  of  all  the  various  phenomena  of  the  sensible 
creation  ; and,  of  course,  a polytheism,  as  must  be  the 
first  religion  of  any  people  who  without  higher  light 
are  striving  to  solve  for  themselves  the  problem  of  the 
universe.  But  even  in  the  earliest  Vedic  religion  ap- 
pears a tendency  toward  an  ethical  and  monotheistic 
development,  evidenced  especially  by  the  lofty  and  en- 
nobling attributes  and  authority  ascribed  to  the  god 
Varuna  : and  this  tendency,  afterward  unfortunately 
checked  and  rendered  inoperative  in  the  Indian  branch 
of  the  race,  seems  to  have  gone  on  in  Persia  to  an  en- 
tire transformation  of  the  natural  religion  into  an  ethi- 
cal, of  the  polytheism  into  a monotheism  ; a transfor- 
mation effected  especially  by  the  teachings  of  the 
religious  reformer  Zoroaster.  It  is  far  from  improbable 
that  Varuna  himself  is  the  god  out  of  whom  the  Ira- 
nians made  their  supreme  divinity  : the  ancient  name, 
however,  appears  nowhere  in  their  religious  records  ; 
they  have  given  him  a new  title,  Ahura-Mazdd,  “ Spirit- 
ual Mighty-one,”  or  “Wise-one  ” (Aura-Mazda  of  the  In- 
scriptions ; Oromasdes  and  Ormuzd  of  the  classics  and 
modern  Persians).  The  name  itself  indicates  the  origin 
of  the  conception  to  which  it  is  given  ; a popular  relig- 
ion does  not  so  entitle  its  creations,  if,  indeed,  it  brings 
forth  any  of  so  elevated  and  spiritual  a character. 
Ahura  Mazda  is  a purely  spiritual  conception  ; he  is 
clothed  with  no  external  form  or  human  attributes  ; he 
is  the  creator  and  ruler  of  the  universe,  the  author  of 
all  good  ; he  is  the  only  being  to  whom  the  name  of 
God  can  with  propriety  be  applied  in  the  Iranian  relig- 
ion. Other  beings,  of  subordinate  rank  and  inferior 
dignity,  are  in  some  measure  associated  with  him  in  the 
exercise  of  his  authority  ; such  are  Mithra,  an  ancient 
sun-god,  the  almost  inseparable  companion  of  Varuna 
in  the  Vedic  invocations,  and  the  seven  Amshaspands 


262 


WILLIAM  D WIG II 7’  WHITNEY 


(Amesha-fpenta,  “ Immortal  Ploly-ones  ”),  whose  iden- 
tity with  the  Adityas  of  the  Veda  has  been  conjectured  ; 
they  appear  here,  however,  with  new  titles,  expressive 
of  moral  attributes.  The  other  gods  of  the  original 
Aryan  faith,  although  they  have  retained  their  ancient 
name  of  daeva  (Sanskrit  dew),  have  lost  their  individ- 
uality and  dignity,  and  have  been  degraded  into  the 
demons.  ...  At  their  head,  and  the  chief  embod- 
iment of  the  spirit  which  inspires  them,  is  Angura- 
Mainyus  ( Arimanius , Ahriman ),  the  “ Sinful-minded,” 
or  “ Malevolent  ” ; his  name  is  one  given  him  as  antith- 
esis to  the  frequent  epithet  of  Ahura-Mazdk,  (ppento - 
Mainyus , “ holy-minded,”  or  “ benevolent.”  This  side 
of  the  religion  came  to  receive,  however,  a peculiar  de- 
velopment, which  finally  converted  the  religion  itself 
into  dualism.  Such  was  not  its  character  at  the  period 
represented  by  the  Avesta ; then  the  demons  were  sim- 
ply the  embodiment  of  whatever  evil  influences  existed 
in  the  universe,  of  all  that  man  has  to  hate,  and  fear, 
and  seek  protection  against.  This  was  the  Persian  or 
Zoroastrian  solution  of  the  great  problem  of  the  origin 
of  evil.  There  was  wickedness,  impurity,  unhappiness, 
in  the  world ; but  this  could  not  be  the  work  of  the 
holy  and  benevolent  Creator  Ahura-Mazda  ; the  mal- 
evolence of  Angura-Mainyus  and  his  infernal  legions 
must  have  produced  it.  Later,  however,  a reasoning 
and  systematizing  philosophy  inquires  : how  came  there 
to  be  such  a malevolent  being  in  the  fair  world  of  a be- 
nevolent Creator  ? can  he  have  been  produced  by  him  ? 
and  why,  if  an  inferior  and  subject  power,  is  he  not  an- 
nihilated, or  his  power  to  harm  taken  away  ? and  then 
arises  the  doctrine  that  the  powers  of  good  and  of  evil 
are  independent  and  equal,  ever  warring  with  one  an- 
other, neither  able  wholly  to  subdue  its  adversary. 
This  latter  phase  of  belief  is  known  to  have  appeared 
very  early  in  the  history  of  the  Zoroastrian  religion  ; 
the  philosophers  aided  in  its  development  by  setting  up 
an  undefined  being,  Zervanakerene,  “ time  unbounded,” 
from  which  were  made  to  originate  the  two  hostile 
principles,  and  for  which  they  sought  to  find  a place 
among  the  original  tenets  of  their  religion  by  a misim 
terpretation  of  certain  passages  in  the  sacred  texts. 


WILLIAM  DWIGHT  WHITNEY 


263 


Such  being  the  constitution  of  the  universe,  such  the 
powers  by  which  it  was  governed,  the  revelation  was 
made  by  the  benevolent  Creator  to  his  chosen  servant 
for  the  purpose  of  instructing  mankind  with  reference 
to  their  condition,  and  of  teaching  them  how  to  aid  the 
good,  how  to  avoid  and  overcome  the  evil.  The  gen- 
eral features  of  the  method  by  which  this  end  was  to 
be  attained  are  worthy  of  all  praise  and  approval.  It 
was  by  seduously  maintaining  purity,  in  thought,  word, 
and  deed  ; by  truthfulness,  temperance,  chastity  ; by 
prayer  and  homage  to  Ahura-Mazda  and  the  other  be- 
nevolent powers  ; by  the  performance  of  good  works, 
by  the  destruction  of  noxious  creatures  ; by  everything 
that  could  contribute  to  the  welfare  and  happiness  of 
the  human  race.  No  cringing  and  deprecatory  worship 
of  the  powers  of  evil  was  enjoined  ; toward  them  the 
attitude  of  the  worshipper  of  Mazda  was  to  be  one  of 
uncompromising  hostility  ; by  the  power  of  a pure  and 
righteous  walk  he  was  to  confound  and  frustrate  their 
malevolent  attempts  against  his  peace.  . . . Fire 

was  kept  constantly  burning  in  an  enclosed  space  ; not 
in  a temple,  for  idols  and  temples  have  been  alike  un- 
known throughout  the  whole  course  of  Persian  history  ; 
and  before  it,  as  in  a spot  consecrated  by  the  special 
presence  of  the  divinity,  were  performed  the  chief  rites 
of  worship.  ...  An  object  of  worship,  properly  so 
called,  it  never  was. — Oriental  atid  Linguistic  Studk\  zst 
Series . 


WHITTIER,  John  Greenleaf,  an  American 
poet,  born  at  Haverhill,  Mass.,  December  17, 
1807;  died  at  Hampton  Falls,  N.  H,  September 
7,  1892.  Of  Quaker  parentage,  he  always  re- 
mained a member  of  the  Society  of  Friends.  Up 
to  his  eighteenth  year  he  worked  on  the  farm ; 
then  attended  an  academy  for  two  years,  writing 
occasional  verses  for  the  local  newspaper,  and  in 
1829  became  editor  of  the  American  Manufacturer , 
at  Boston.  In  1830  he  become  editor  of  the  Con- 
necticut Mirror , at  Hartford,  and  wrote  a memoir  of 
John  G.  C.  Brainard,  his  predecessor.  In  1836 
he  was  elected  Secretary  of  the  newly  formed 
American  Anti-Slavery  Society,  and  became  ed- 
itor of  the  Pennsylvania  Freeman , at  Philadelphia. 
In  1 840  he  took  up  his  permanent  residence  at 
Amesbury,  Mass. 

Whittier’s  poems  appeared  from  time  to  time 
in  separate  volumes,  sometimes  made  up  mainly 
of  pieces  previously  published  in  periodical  The 
principal  of  the  longer  poems  are  : Legends  of  New 
England  (1831);  Mogg Megone  (1836)  ; The  Bridal  of 
Pennacook  (1837);  In  War  Time  (1864) ; Snow-Bound 
(1865);  The  Tent  on  the  Beach  (1867);  Among  the 
Hills  (1868) ; The  Vision  of  Echard,  and  Other  Poems 
(1877).  The  smaller  poems,  something  like  four 
hundred  in  number,  constituting  the  greater  por- 
tion of  the  whole,  have  been  arranged  by  the  au- 
(264) 


m liBiUBV 
OF  THE 

MMfswin  tfiuw 


JOHN  GREENLEAF  WHITTIER  265 

thor  under  several  heads,  among  which  are  : “ Leg- 
endary,’* “Voices  of  Freedom,**  “Voices  of  La- 
bor,” “ Home  Ballads,**  “ Poems  and  Lyrics,”  and 
“ Miscellaneous.’*  Several  volumes  made  up  of  his 
various  prose  writings  have  been  published.  The 
principal  of  these  are  : Old  Portraits  and  Modern 
Sketches  (1850),  and  Literary  Recreations  and  M is- 
cellanies , of  a late  date.  The  later  productions  of 
Whittier  include  The  Kings  Missive  (1881);  Bay 
of  Seven  Islands  (1883) ; Poems  of  Nature  (1886)  ; St . 
Gregory  s Guest  (1886) ; At  Sundown  (1892).  His 
complete  works  up  to  that  date  were  published  in 
1888-89. 

The  first  collected  edition  of  Whittier’s  poems 
was  published  in  1857.  It  includes  forty  stanzas 
addressed  to  an  infant  who  had  been  named  after 
him.  In  this  poem,  of  which  only  a portion  is 
here  given,  the  poet  gives  a picture  of  himself  as 
he  had  come  to  be  at  the  age  of  fifty.* 

MY  NAMESAKE. 

You  scarcely  need  my  tardy  thanks, 

Who,  self-rewarded,  nurse  and  tend — 

A Green-leaf  on  your  own  Green-banks— 

The  memory  of  your  friend. 

For  me,  no  wreath,  bloom-woven,  hides 
The  sobered  brow  and  lessening  hair  t 
For  aught  I know,  the  myrtled  sides 
Of  Helicon  are  bare. 

Yet  not  the  less  I own  your  claim 

To  grateful  thanks,  dear  friends  of  mine 
Hang,  if  it  please  you  so,  my  name 
Upon  your  household  line. 

* Whittier’s  Poems,  by  permission  of  Houghton,  Mifflin  & Co. 


JOHN  GREENLEAF  WHITTIER 

Still  shall  that  name,  as  now,  recall 
The  young  leaf  wet  with  morning  dew, 

The  glory  where  the  sunbeams  fall 
The  breezy  woodlands  through. 

And  thou,  dear  child,  in  riper  days 
When  asked  the  reason  of  thy  name, 

Shalt  answer  : “ One  ’twere  vain  to  praise 
Or  censure  bore  the  same. 

“ Some  blamed  him,  some  believed  him  good, 
The  truth  lay  doubtless  ’twixt  the  two  ; 

He  reconciled  as  best  he  could 
Old  faiths  and  fancies  new. 

“ He  loved  his  friends,  forgave  his  foes  ; 
And,  if  his  words  were  harsh  at  times, 

He  spared  his  fellow-men  ; his  blows 
Fell  only  on  their  crimes. 

“ He  loved  the  good  and  wise ; but  found 
His  human  heart  to  all  akin 

Who  met  him  on  the  common  ground 
Of  suffering  and  of  sin. 

“ He  had  his  share  of  care  and  pain ; 

No  holiday  was  life  to  him  ; 

Still  in  the  heirloom  cup  we  drain 
The  bitter  drop  will  swim. 

“Yet  Heaven  was  kind,  and  here  a bird 
And  there  a flower  beguiled  his  way  ; 

And  cool,  in  summer  noons,  he  heard 
The  fountains  plash  and  play. 

“On  all  his  sad  or  restless  moods 
The  patient  peace  of  Nature  stole  ; 

The  quiet  of  the  fields  and  woods 
Sank  deep  into  his  soul. 

“He  worshipped  as  his  fathers  did, 

And  kept  the  faith  of  childish  days : 


JOHN  GREENLEAF  • WHITTIER 


267 


And,  howsoe’er  he  strayed  or  slid. 

He  loved  the  good  old  ways. 

“ The  simple  tastes,  the  kindly  traits, 

The  tranquil  air,  and  gentle  speech, 

The  silence  of  the  soul  that  waits 
For  more  than  man  can  teach. 

“ The  cant  of  party,  school  and  sect, 
Provoked  at  times  his  honest  scorn, 

And  Folly,  in  its  gray  respect, 

He  tossed  on  satire’s  horn. 

‘‘But  still  his  heart  was  full  of  awe 
And  reverence  for  all  sacred  things ; 

And,  brooding  over  form  and  law, 

He  saw  the  Spirit’s  wings. 

“ He  saw  the  old-time’s  groves  and  shrines, 
In  the  long  distance  fair  and  dim ; 

And  heard,  like  sound  of  far-off  pines, 

The  century-mellowed  hymn. 

“ He  dared  not  mock  the  Dervish  whirl, 

The  Brahmin’s  rite,  the  Lama’s  spell  'f 

God  knew  the  heart,  Devotion’s  pearl 
Might  sanctify  the  shell. 

“While  others  trod  the  altar-stairs, 

He  faltered  like  the  publican  ; 

And,  while  they  praised  as  saints,  his  praye** 
Were  those  of  sinful  man. 

“For,  awed  by  Sinai’s  Mount  of  Law, 

The  trembling  faith  alone  sufficed, 

That,  through  the  cloud  and  flame,  he  saw 
The  sweet,  sad  face  of  Christ. 

“And  listening,  with  his  forehead  bowed, 
Heard  the  divine  compassions  fill 

The  pauses  of  the  trump  and  cloud 
With  whispers  small  and  still. 


268  JOHN  GREENLEAF  WHITTIER 

“ The  words  he  spake,  the  thoughts  he  penned 
Are  mortal  as  his  thoughts  and  brain  ; 

But,  if  they  served  the  Master’s  end, 

He  has  not  lived  in  vain.” 

Heaven  make  thee  better  than  thy  name, 

Child  of  my  friends ! For  thee  I crave 

What  riches  never  brought,  nor  fame 
To  mortal  longing  gave. 

I pray  the  prayer  of  Plato  old  ; 

God  make  thee  beautiful  within  ; 

And  let  thine  eyes  the  good  behold 
In  everything  save  sin  ! 

Imagination  held  in  check 

To  serve,  not  rule,  thy  poised  mind  ; 

Thy  Reason,  at  the  frown  or  beck 
Of  Conscience,  loose  or  bind. 

No  dreamer  thou,  but  real  all — 

Strong  manhood  crowning  vigorous  youth  ; 

Life  made  by  duty  epical, 

And  rhythmic  with  the  truth. 

So  shall  that  life  the  fruitage  yield 
Which  trees  of  healing  only  give, 

And,  green-leafed  in  the  Eternal  field 
Of  God,  forever  live  ! 

During  the  ensuing  twenty  years  were  written 
not  a few  of  Whittier’s  best  poems.  A volume 
containing  some  of  the  latest  of  these  was  pub- 
lished in  1877,  concluding  with  the  following  re- 
trospect of  his  past  life  of  threescore  years  and 
ten : 

AT  EVENTIDE. 

Poor  and  inadequate  the  shadow-play 

Of  gain  and  loss,  of  waking  and  of  dream, 

Against  Life’s  solemn  background  needs  must  seem 


JOHN  GREENLEAF  WHITTIER 


269 


At  this  late  hour.  Yet  not  unthankfully 
I call  to  mind  the  fountains  by  the  way, 

The  breath  of  flowers,  the  bird-song  on  the  spray, 
Dear  friends,  sweet  human  loves,  the  joy  of  giving 
And  of  receiving  the  great  boon  of  living 
In  grand,  historic  years  when  Liberty 
Had  need  of  word  and  work  ; quick  sympathies 
For  all  who  fail  and  suffer  ; song’s  relief ; 

Nature’s  uncloying  loveliness  ; and,  chief, 

The  kind,  restraining  hand  of  Providence  ; 

The  inward  witness  ; the  assuming  sense 
Of  an  Eternal  Good  which  overlies 

The  sorrow  of  the  world  ; Love  which  outlives 
All  sin  and  wrong  ; Compassion  which  forgives 
To  the  uttermost ; and  Justice,  whose  clear  eyes 
Through  lapse  and  failure  look  to  the  intent, 

And  judge  our  frailty  by  the  life  we  meant. 

Whittier’s  day  did  not  close  with  the  eventide 
of  threescore  years ; there  was  a serene  twilight 
of  more  than  a half  score  of  years.  His  career  as 
a poet  lasted  for  more  than  sixty  years,  begin- 
ning with  the  publication  of  his  Legeyids  of  New 
England , in  1831* 

SONG  OF  THE  FREE. 

Pride  of  New  England  ! Soul  of  our  fathers  ! 

Think  we  all  craven-like,  when  the  storm  gathers? 
What  though  the  tempest  be  over  us  lowering, 

Where’s  the  New-Englander  shamefully  cowering  ? 
Graves  green  and  holy  around  us  are  lying  ; — 

Free  were  the  sleepers  all,  living  and  dying. 

Back  with  the  Southerner’s  paddocks  and  scourges! 

Go — let  him  fetter  down  ocean’s  free  surges ! 

Go — let  him  silence  winds,  clouds,  and  waters  ■ 

Never  New  England’s  own  free  sons  and  daughters ! 
Free  as  our  rivers  are  oceanward  going — 

Free  as  the  breezes  are  over  us  blowing. 


270 


JOHN  GREEN  LEAF  WHITTIER 


Up  to  our  altars,  then,  haste  we,  and  summon 
Courage  and  loveliness — manhood  and  woman  ! 
Deep  let  our  pledges  be  : Freedom  forever  l 
Truce  with  oppression — never,  oh,  never! 

By  our  own  birthright-gift,  granted  of  Heaven — 
Freedom  for  heart  and  lip,  be  the  pledge  given ! 

If  we  have  whispered  truth,  whisper  no  longer  , 
Speak  as  the  tempest  does,  sterner  and  stronger. 
Still  be  the  tones  of  truth  louder  and  firmer, 
Startling  the  haughty  South  with  the  deep  murmur  „ 
God  and  our  charter’s  right,  freedom  forever ! 
Truce  with  oppression — never,  oh,  never! 

ichabod  ! 

So  fallen  ! So  lost  ! the  light  withdrawn 
Which  once  he  wore ! 

The  glory  from  his  gray  hairs  gone 
Forever  more ! 

Revile  him  not — the  Tempter  hath 
A snare  for  all  ; 

And  pitying  tears,  not  scorn  and  wrath, 

Befit  his  fall. 

Oh,  dumb  be  passion’s  stormy  rage. 

When  he  who  might 

Have  lighted  up  and  led  his  age, 

Falls  back  in  night. 

Scorn  ! would  the  angels  laugh  to  mark 
A bright  soul  driven, 

Fiend-goaded  down  the  endless  dark, 

From  hope  and  heaven  1 

Let  not  the  land,  once  proud  of  him, 

Insult  him  now, 

Nor  brand  with  deeper  shame  his  dim, 
Dishonored  brow. 

But  let  its  humbled  sons,  instead, 

From  sea  to  lake, 

A long  lament,  as  for  the  dead, 

In  sadness  make. 


JOHN  GREENLEAF  WHITTIER 


271 


Of  all  we  loved  and  honored,  naught 
Save  power  remains  : 

A fallen  angel’s  pride  of  thought, 

Still  strong  in  chains. 

All  else  is  gone  ; from  those  great  eyes 
The  soul  has  fled  ; 

When  faith  is  lost,  when  honor  dies, 

The  Man  is  dead. 

Then  pay  the  reverence  of  old  days 
To  his  dead  fame  ; 

Walk  backward,  with  averted  gaze, 

And  hide  the  shame. 

THE  KANSAS  EMIGRANTS. 

We  cross  the  prairie,  as  of  old 
The  Pilgrims  crossed  the  sea, 

To  make  the  West,  as  they  the  East, 

The  homestead  of  the  free. 

We  go  to  rear  a wall  of  men 
On  Freedom’s  southern  line, 

And  plant  beside  the  cotton-tree 
The  rugged  Northern  pine. 

We’re  flowing  from  our  native  hills. 

As  our  free  rivers  flow  ; 

The  blessing  of  our  Mother-land 
Is  with  us  as  we  go. 

Upbearing,  like  the  Ark  of  God, 

The  Bible  in  our  van, 

We  go  to  test  the  truth  of  God, 

Against  the  fraud  of  Man. 

No  pause,  nor  rest,  save  where  the  streams 
That  feed  the  Kansas  run, 

Save  where  our  Pilgrim  gonfalon 
Shall  flout  the  setting  sun. 

We’ll  tread  the  prairie,  as  of  old 
Our  fathers  sailed  the  sea  ; 

And  make  the  West,  as  they  the  East, 

The  homestead  of  the  free. 


272 


JOHN  GREENLEAF  WHITTIER 


BROWN  OF  OSSAWATOMIE. — 1 859. 

John  Brown  of  Ossawatomie  spake  on  his  dying  day  : 

“ I will  not  have  to  shrive  my  soul  a priest  in  Sla- 
very’s pay ; 

But  let  some  poor  slave-mother  whom  I have  striv’n 
to  free, 

With  her  children,  from  the  gallows-stairs  put  up  a 
prayer  for  me  ! ” 

John  Brown  of  Ossawatomie,  they  led  him  out  to  die  ; 

And  lo  ! a poor  slave-mother  with  her  little  child 
pressed  nigh. 

Then  the  bold,  blue  eyes  grew  tender,  and  the  old,  harsh 
face  grew  mild, 

As  he  stooped  between  the  jeering  ranks  and  kissed 
the  negro’s  child. 

The  shadows  of  his  stormy  life  that  moment  fell  apart ; 

And  they  who  blamed  the  bloody  hand  forgave  the 
loving  heart. 

That  kiss  from  all  its  guilty  means  reclaimed  the  good 
intent, 

And  round  the  grisly  fighter’s  hair  the  martyr’s  aureole 
bent. 

Perish  with  him  the  folly  that  seeks  through  evil  good  ! 

Long  live  the  generous  purpose  unstained  with  human 
blood ! 

Not  the  raid  of  midnight  terror,  but  the  thought  which 
underlies ; 

Not  the  Borderer’s  pride  of  daring,  but  the  Christian’s 
sacrifice  ! 

Never  more  may  you,  Blue  Ridge,  the  Northern  rifle 
hear, 

Nor  see  the  light  of  blazing  homes  flash  on  the  negro’s 
spear  ; 

But  let  the  free-winged  angel  Truth  their  guarded  passes 
scale, 

To  teach  that  right  is  more  than  might,  and  justice 
more  than  mail ! 


JOHN  GREENLEAF  WHITTIER 


273 


So  vainly  shall  Virginia  set  her  battle  in  array  ; 

In  vain  her  trampling  squadrons  knead  the  winter  snow 
with  clay. 

She  may  strike  the  pouncing  eagle,  but  she  dares  not 
harm  the  dove  ; 

And  every  gate  she  bars  to  Hate  shall  open  wide  tc 
Love. 

THE  BATTLE  AUTUMN  OF  1862. 

The  flags  of  war  like  storm-birds  fly, 

The  charging  trumpets  blow  ; 

Yet  rolls  no  thunder  in  the  sky, 

No  earthquake  strives  below. 

And,  calm  and  patient,  Nature  keeps 
Her  ancient  promise  well, 

Though  o’er  her  bloom  and  greenness  sweeps 
The  battle’s  breath  of  hell. 

And  still  she  walks  in  golden  hours 
Through  harvest-happy  farms, 

And  still  she  wears  her  fruits  and  flowers, 

Like  jewels  on  her  arms. 

What  mean  the  gladness  of  the  plain, 

The  joy  of  eve  and  morn  ; 

The  mirth  that  shakes  the  beard  of  grain, 

And  yellow  locks  of  corn  ? 

Ah  ! eyes  may  well  be  full  of  tears, 

And  hearts  with  hate  are  hot ; 

But  even-paced  come  round  the  years, 

And  Nature  changes  not. 

She  meets  with  smiles  our  bitter  grief, 

With  songs  our  groans  of  pain  ; 

She  mocks  with  tint  of  flower  and  leaf 
The  war-field’s  crimson  stain. 

Still  in  the  cannon’s  pause  we  hear 
Her  sweet  thanksgiving  psalm  ; 

Too  near  to  God  for  doubt  or  fear, 

She  shares  the  eternal  calm. 


274 


JOHN  GREENLEAF  WHITTIER 


She  knows  the  seed  lies  safe  below 
The  fires  that  blast  and  burn  ; 

For  all  the  tears  of  blood  we  sow 
She  waits  the  rich  return. 

Oh,  give  to  us,  in  times  like  these, 

The  vision  of  her  eyes  ; 

And  make  her  fields  and  fruited  trees 
Our  golden  prophecies ! 

Oh,  give  to  us  her  finer  ear  ! 

Above  this  stormy  din 
We,  too,  would  hear  the  bells  of  cheer 
Ring  Peace  and  Freedom  in. 

BARBARA  FRIETCHIE. 

Up  from  the  meadows  rich  with  corn, 

Clear  in  the  cool  September  morn, 

The  clustered  spires  of  Frederick  stand 
Green-walled  by  the  hills  of  Maryland. 

Round  about  them  orchards  sweep, 

Apple  and  peach  tree  fruited  deep, 

Fair  as  a garden  of  the  Lord 

To  the  eyes  of  the  famished  rebel  horde 

On  that  pleasant  morn  of  the  early  fall 
When  Lee  marched  over  the  mountain-wall 

Over  the  mountains,  winding  down, 

Horse  and  foot  into  Frederick  town. 

Forty  flags  with  their  silver  stars, 

Forty  flags  with  their  crimson  bars, 

Flapped  in  the  morning  wind  : the  sun 
Of  noon  looked  down,  and  saw  not  one. 

Up  rose  old  Barbara  Frietchie  then, 

Bowed  with  her  fourscore  years  and  ten  : 

Bravest  of  all  in  Frederick  town, 

She  took  up  the  flag  the  men  hauled  down 


JOHN  GREEN  LEAF  WHITTIER 


275 


In  her  attic  window  the  staff  she  set, 

To  show  that  one  heart  was  loyal  yet. 

Up  the  street  came  the  rebel  tread, 
Stonewall  Jackson  riding  ahead. 

Under  his  slouched  hat  left  and  right 
He  glanced  ; the  old  flag  met  his  sight. 

“ Halt  ! ” — the  dust-brown  ranks  stood  fast 
“ Fire  ! ” — out  blazed  the  rifle  blast. 

It  shivered  the  window,  pane  and  sash  ; 

It  rent  the  banner  with  seam  and  gash. 

Quick  as  it  fell,  from  the  broken  staff 
Dame  Barbara  snatched  the  silken  scarf ; 

She  leaned  far  out  on  the  window-sill, 

And  shook  it  forth  with  a royal  will. 

“ Shoot,  if  you  must,  this  old  gray  head, 

But  spare  your  country’s  flag,”  she  said. 

A shade  of  sadness,  a blush  of  shame, 

Over  the  face  of  the  leader  came  ; 

The  nobler  nature  within  him  stirred 
To  life  at  that  woman’s  deed  and  word : 

“ Who  touches  a hair  of  yon  gray  head 
Dies  like  a dog  ! March  on  ! ” he  said. 

All  day  long  through  Frederick  street 
Sounded  the  tread  of  marching  feet : 

All  day  long  that  free  flag  tost 
Over  the  heads  of  the  rebel  host. 

Ever  its  torn  folds  rose  and  fell 
On  the  loyal  winds  that  loved  it  well ; 

And  through  the  hill-gaps  sunset-light 
Shone  over  it  with  a warm  good-night. 

Barbara  Frietchie’s  work  is  o’er, 

And  the  Rebel  rides  on  his  raids  no  more. 
Vql,  XXIV  — 18 


276 


JOHN  GREENLEAF  WHITTIER 


Honor  to  her  ! and  let  a tear 

Fall  for  her  sake,  on  Stonewall’s  bier. 

Over  Barbara  Frietchie’s  grave, 

Flag  of  Freedom  and  Union  wave  ! 

Peace  and  order  and  beauty  draw 
Round  thy  symbol  of  light  and  law  ; 

And  ever  the  stars  above  look  down 
On  thy  stars  below  in  Frederick  town  ! 

THE  PEACE-AUTUMN  : 1865. 

Thank  God  for  rest,  where  none  molest, 

And  none  can  make  afraid  ; 

For  Peace  that  sits  at  Plenty’s  quest 
Beneath  the  homestead  shade  ! 

Bring  pipe  and  gun,  the  sword’s  red  scourge. 
The  negro’s  broken  chains, 

And  beat  them  at  the  blacksmith’s  forge 
To  ploughshares  for  our  plains. 

Alike  henceforth  our  hills  of  snow, 

And  vales  where  cotton  flowers ; 

All  winds  that  blow,  all  streams  that  flow, 
Are  Freedom’s  motive-powers. 

Build  up  an  altar  to  the  Lord, 

O grateful  hearts  of  ours  ; 

And  shape  it  of  the  greenest  sward 
That  ever  drank  the  showers. 

There  let  our  banners  droop  and  flow, 

The  stars  uprise  and  fall  ; 

Our  roll  of  martyrs,  sad  and  slow, 

Let  sighing  breezes  call. 

There  let  the  common  heart  keep  time 
To  such  an  anthem  sung 
As  never  swelled  on  poet’s  rhyme, 

Or  thrilled  on  singer’s  tongue ; 

Song  of  our  burden  and  relief, 

Of  peace  and  long  annoy  ; 

The  passion  of  our  mighty  grief, 

And  our  exceeding  joy  ! 


JOHN  GREENLEAF  WHITTIER 


277 


A song  of  praise  to  Him  who  filled 
The  harvests  sown  in  tears, 

And  gave  each  field  a double  yield 
To  feed  our  battle-years  ! 

A song  of  faith  that  trusts  the  end 
To  match  the  good  begun  ; 

Nor  doubts  the  power  of  Love  to  blend 
The  hearts  of  men  as  one  ! 

SHUT  IN. 

The  moon  above  the  eastern  wood 
Shone  at  its  full  ; the  hill-range  stood 
Transfigured  in  the  silver  flood, 

Its  blown  snows  flashing  cold  and  keen, 
Dead  white,  save  where  some  sharp  ravine 
Took  shadow,  or  the  sombre  green 
Of  hemlocks  turned  to  pitchy  black 
Against  the  whiteness  at  their  back. 

For  such  a world  and  such  a night 
Most  fitting  that  unwarming  light, 

Which  only  seemed,  where’er  it  fell, 

To  make  the  coldness  visible. 

Shut  in  from  all  the  world  without, 

We  sat  the  clean-winged  hearth  about, 
Content  to  let  the  north  wind  roar 
In  baffled  rage  at  pane  and  door, 

While  the  red  logs  before  us  beat 
The  frost-line  back  with  tropic  heat ; 

And  ever,  when  a louder  blast 
Shook  beam  and  rafter  as  it  passed, 

The  merrier  up  its  roaring  draught 
The  great  throat  of  the  chimney  laughed. 
The  house-dog  on  his  paws  outspread 
Laid  to  the  fire  his  drowsy  head, 

The  cat’s  dark  silhouette  on  the  wall 
A couchant  tiger’s  seemed  to  fall  ; 

And  for  the  winter  fireside  meet, 

Between  the  andirons’  straddling  feet, 
The  mug  of  cider  simmered  slow, 


JOHN  GREENLEAF  WHITTIER 


The  apples  sputtered  in  a row, 

And  close  at  hand,  the  basket  stood 
With  nuts  from  brown  October’s  wood. 

What  matter  how  the  night  behaved  ? 

What  matter  how  the  north-wind  raved  ? 

Blow  high,  blow  low,  not  all  its  snow 
Could  quench  our  hearth-fire’s  ruddy  glow. 

O Time  and  Change  ! — with  hair  as  gray 
As  was  my  sire’s  that  winter  day, 

How  strange  it  seems,  with  so  much  gone 
Of  life  and  love,  to  still  live  on  ! 

Ah,  brother,  only  I and  thou 
Are  left  of  all  that  circle  now, 

The  dear  home-faces  whereupon 
That  fitful  firelight  paled  and  shone, 
Henceforward  listen  as  we  will, 

The  voices  of  that  hearth  are  still ; 

Look  where  we  may,  the  wide  earth  o’er, 
Those  lighted  faces  smile  no  more. 

We  tread  the  paths  their  feet  have  worn, 

We  sit  beneath  their  orchard-trees, 

We  hear,  like  them,  the  hum  of  bees 
And  rustle  of  the  bladed  corn  ! 

We  turn  the  pages  that  they  read, 

Their  written  words  we  linger  o’er, 

But  in  the  sun  they  cast  no  shade, 

No  voice  is  heard,  no  sign  is  made, 

No  step  is  on  the  conscious  floor ! 

Yet  Love  will  dream,  and  Faith  will  trust, 
(Since  He  who  knows  our  need  is  just), 

That  somehow,  somewhere,  meet  we  must. 
Alas  for  him  who  never  sees 
The  stars  shine  through  his  cypress-trees  ! 
Who  hopeless  lays  his  dead  away, 

Nor  looks  to  see  the  breaking  day 
Across  the  mournful  marbles  play  ! 

Who  hath  not  learned  in  hours  of  faith 
The  truth  to  flesh  and  sense  unknown, 

That  Life  is  ever  Lord  of  Death, 

And  Love  can  never  lose  its  own  ! 

— Snow  Bound. 


JOHN  GREENLEAF  WHITTIER 


27c 


MAUD  MULLER. 

Maud  Muller,  on  a summer’s  day. 

Raked  the  meadow,  sweet  with  hay. 

Beneath  her  torn  hat  glowed  the  wealth 
Of  simple  beauty  and  rustic  health. 

Singing,  she  wrought,  and  her  merry  glee 
The  mock-bird  echoed  from  his  tree. 

But  when  she  glanced  to  the  far-off  town, 

White  from  its  hill-slope  looking  down, 

The  sweet  song  died,  and  a vague  unrest 
And  a nameless  longing  filled  her  breast — 

A wish,  that  she  hardly  dared  to  own, 

For  something  better  than  she  had  known. 

The  Judge  rode  slowly  down  the  lane, 

Smoothing  his  horse’s  chestnut  mane. 

He  drew  his  bridle  in  the  shade 
Of  the  apple-trees,  to  greet  the  maid, 

And  ask  a draught  from  the  spring  that  flowed 
Through  the  meadow  across  the  road. 

She  stooped  where  the  cool  spring  bubbled  up, 
And  filled  for  him  her  small  tin  cup. 

And  blushed  as  she  gave  it,  looking  down 
On  her  feet  so  bare,  and  her  tattered  gown. 

“ Thanks  ! ” said  the  Judge  ; “a  sweeter  draught 
From  a fairer  hand  was  never  quaffed.” 

He  spoke  of  the  grass  and  flowers  and  trees, 

Of  the  singing  birds  and  the  humming  bees  ; 

Then  talked  of  the  haying,  and  wondered  whether 
The  cloud  in  the  west  would  bring  foul  weather. 

And  Maud  forgot  her  brier-torn  gown. 

And  her  graceful  ankles,  bare  and  brown  ; 


JOHN  GREENLEAF  WHITTIER 

And  listened,  while  a pleased  surprise 
Looked  from  her  long-lashed,  hazel  eyes. 

At  last,  like  one  who  for  delay 
Seeks  a vain  excuse,  he  rode  away. 

Maud  Muller  looked  and  sighed  : “ Ah  me  ! 
That  I the  Judge’s  bride  might  be! 

“ He  would  dress  me  up  ui  silks  so  fine, 

And  praise  and  toast  me  at  his  wine. 

“ My  father  should  wear  a broadcloth  coat ; 

My  brother  should  sail  a painted  boat. 

“I’d  dress  my  mother  so  grand  and  gay, 

And  the  baby  should  have  a new  toy  each  day. 

“And  I’d  feed  the  hungry  and  clothe  the  poor, 
And  all  should  bless  me  who  left  our  door.” 

The  Judge  looked  back  as  he  climbed  the  hill, 
And  saw  Maud  Muller  standing  still. 

“ A form  more  fair,  a face  more  sweet, 

Ne’er  hath  it  been  my  lot  to  meet. 

“And  her  modest  answer  and  graceful  air 
Show  her  wise  and  good  as  she  is  fair. 

“Would  she  were  mine,  and  I to-day, 

Like  her,  a harvester  of  hay  : 

“No  doubtful  balance  of  rights  and  wrongs, 
Nor  weary  lawyers  with  endless  tongues, 

“ But  low  of  cattle  and  song  of  birds, 

And  health  and  quiet  and  loving  words.” 

But  he  thought  of  his  sisters  proud  and  cold, 
And  his  mother  vain  of  her  rank  and  gold. 

So,  closing  his  heart,  the  Judge  rode  on, 

And  Maud  was  left  in  the  field  alone. 

But  the  lawyers  smiled  that  afternoon, 

When  he  hummed  in  court  an  old  love-tune  $ 


JOHN  GREENLEAF  WHITTIER 

And  the  young  girl  mused  beside  the  well. 

Till  the  rain  on  the  unraked  clover  fell. 

He  wedded  a wife  of  richest  dower, 

Who  lived  for  fashion,  as  he  for  power. 

Yet  oft,  in  his  marble  hearth’s  bright  glow. 

He  watched  a picture  come  and  go ; 

And  sweet  Maud  Muller’s  hazel  eyes 
Looked  out  in  their  innocent  surprise. 

Oft,  when  the  wine  in  his  glass  was  red, 

He  longed  for  the  wayside  well  instead  ; 

And  closed  his  eyes  on  his  garnished  rooms, 
To  dream  of  meadows  and  clover-blooms. 

And  the  proud  man  sighed,  with  a secret  paine 
u Ah,  that  I were  free  again  ! 

“ Free  as  when  I rode  that  day, 

Where  the  barefoot  maiden  raked  her  hay." 

She  wedded  a man  unlearned  and  poor, 

And  many  children  played  round  her  door. 

But  care  and  sorrow,  and  childbirth  pain. 

Left  their  traces  on  heart  and  brain. 

And  oft,  when  the  summer  sun  shone  hot 
On  the  new-mown  hay  in  the  meadow-lot, 

And  she  heard  the  little  spring  brook  fall 
Over  the  roadside,  through  the  wall, 

In  the  shade  of  the  apple-tree  again 
She  saw  a rider  draw  his  rein, 

And,  gazing  down  with  timid  grace, 

She  felt  his  pleased  eyes  read  her  face. 

Sometimes  her  narrow  kitchen  walls 
Stretched  away  into  stately  halls  ; 

The  weary  wheel  to  a spinnet  turned, 

The  tallow  candle  an  astral  burned. 


JOHN  GREENLEAF  WHITTIER 

And  for  him  who  sat  by  the  chimney  lug, 
Dozing  and  grumbling  o’er  pipe  and  mug, 

A manly  form  at  her  side  she  saw, 

And  joy  was  duty,  and  love  was  law. 

Then  she  took  up  her  burden  of  life  again, 
Saying  only,  “ It  might  have  been.” 

Alas  for  maiden,  alas  for  Judge, 

For  rich  repiner  and  household  drudge! 

God  pity  them  both  ! and  pity  us  all, 

Who  vainly  the  dreams  of  youth  recall. 

For  of  all  sad  words  of  tongue  or  pen, 

The  saddest  are  these  : “ It  might  have  been  ! ' 

Ah,  well ! for  us  all  some  sweet  hope  lies 
Deeply  buried  from  human  eyes ; 

And,  in  the  hereafter,  angels  may 
Roll  the  stone  from  its  grave  away ! 

THE  PRAYER  OF  AGASSIZ. 

On  the  isle  of  Penikese, 

Ringed  about  by  sapphire  seas, 

Fanned  by  breezes  salt  and  cool, 

Stood  the  master  with  his  school. 

Over  sails  that  not  in  vain 

Wooed  the  west-wind’s  steady  strain, 

Line  of  coast  that  low  and  far 
Stretched  its  undulating  bar, 

Wings  aslant  along  the  rim 
Of  the  waves  they  stooped  to  skim, 

Rock  and  isle  and  glistening  bay, 

Fell  the  beautiful  white  day. 

Said  the  master  to  the  youth  : 

“ We  have  come  in  search  of  truth, 

Trying  with  uncertain  key 
Door  by  door  of  mystery  ; 

We  are  reaching,  through  His  laws, 

To  the  garment-hem  of  Cause, 

Him,  the  endless,  unbegun, 

The  Unnameable,  the  One, 


JOHN  GREENLF.AF  WHITTIER 


Light  of  all  our  light  the  Source, 

Life  of  life,  and  Force  of  force, 

As  with  fingers  of  the  blind, 

We  are  groping  here  to  find 
What  the  hieroglyphics  mean 
Of  the  Unseen  in  the  seen, 

What  the  Thought  which  underlies 
Nature’s  masking  and  disguise, 

What  it  is  that  hides  beneath 
Blight  and  bloom  and  birth  and  death 
By  past  efforts  unavailing, 

Doubt  and  error,  loss  and  failing, 

Of  our  weakness  made  aware, 

On  the  threshold  of  our  task 
Let  us  light  and  guidance  ask, 

Let  us  pause  in  silent  prayer  ! 99 

Then  the  master  in  his  place 
Bowed  his  head  a little  space, 

And  the  leaves  by  soft  airs  stirred, 
Lapse  of  wave  and  cry  of  bird, 

Left  the  solemn  hush  unbroken 
Of  that  wordless  prayer  unspoken, 
While  its  wish,  on  earth  unsaid, 

Rose  to  heaven  interpreted. 

As  in  life’s  best  hours  we  hear 
By  the  spirit’s  finer  ear 
His  low  voice  within  us,  thus 
The  All-Father  heareth  us ; 

And  His  holy  ear  we  pain 
With  our  noisy  words  and  vain. 

Not  for  Him  our  violence. 

Storming  at  the  gates  of  sense, 

His  the  primal  language,  His 
The  eternal  silences ! 

Even  the  careless  heart  was  moved 
And  the  doubting  gave  assent. 

With  a gesture  reverent, 

To  the  master  well-beloved. 

As  thin  mists  are  glorified 
By  the  light  they  cannot  hide, 

AH  who  gazed  upon  him  saw, 


JOHN  GREENLEAF  WHITTIER 


Through  its  veil  of  tender  awe, 

How  his  face  was  still  uplit 
By  the  old,  sweet  look  of  it, 

Hopeful,  trustful,  full  of  cheer, 

And  the  love  that  casts  out  fear. 

Who  the  secret  may  declare 
Of  that  brief,  unuttered  prayer? 

Did  the  shade  before  him  come. 

Of  the  inevitable  doom, 

Of  the  end  of  earth  so  near, 

And  Eternity’s  new  year  ? 

In  the  lap  of  sheltering  seas 
Rests  the  isle  of  Penikese ; 

But  the  lord  of  the  domain 
Comes  not  to  his  own  again  : 

Where  the  eyes  that  follow  fail, 

On  a vaster  sea  his  sail 
Drifts  beyond  our  beck  and  hail ! 
Other  lips  within  its  bound 
Shall  the  laws  of  life  expound  : 

Other  eyes  from  rock  and  shell 
Read  the  world’s  old  riddles  well ; 
But  when  breezes  light  and  blind 
Blow  from  summer’s  blossomed  land. 
When  the  air  is  glad  with  wings, 

And  the  blithe  song-sparrow  sings. 
Many  an  eye  with  his  still  face 
Shall  the  living  ones  displace, 

Many  an  ear  the  word  shall  seek 
He  alone  could  fitly  speak. 

And  one  name  forevermore 
Shall  be  uttered  o’er  and  o’er 
By  the  waves  that  kiss  the  shore, 

By  the  curlew’s  whistle,  sent 
Down  the  cool,  sea-scented  air ; 

In  all  voices  known  to  her 
Nature  own  her  worshipper, 

Half  in  triumph,  half  lament. 

Thither  love  shall  tearful  turn, 
Friendship  pause  uncovered  there, 
And  the  wisest  reverence  learn 
From  the  master’s  silent  prayer. 


WHYMPER,  Edward,  an  English  traveller, 
born  in  London,  April  27, 1 840.  He  was  educated  by 
private  tutors  and  at  the  Clarendon  House  School ; 
and  was  trained  by  his  father,  a well-known  en- 
graver and  painter,  as  a draughtsman  on  wood, 
but,  preferring  out-door  life,  he  undertook  a series 
of  journeys  which  eventually  changed  the  course 
of  his  life.  In  1861  he  ascended  Mont  Pelvoux, 
then  supposed  to  be  the  highest  mountain  in 
France.  From  its  summit  he  discovered  the 
Pointe  des  Ecrins,  five  hundred  feet  higher,  which 
he  ascended  in  1864.  Between  1861  and  1865  he 
ascended  one  mountain  after  another  till  then 
thought  to  be  inaccessible.  His  ascent  of  the 
Matterhorn,  when  several  companions  lost  their 
lives,  occurred  July  14,  1865.  In  1867  he  explored 
Greenland  and  discovered  important  vegetation 
in  its  high  northern  latitudes.  In  1871  he  pub- 
lished his  Scrambles  Among  the  Alps ; and  the  fol- 
lowing year  he  again  explored  Greenland  in  the 
interest  of  science.  He  travelled  in  Ecuador  in 
1879  and  1880,  and  measured  the  Great  Andes  on 
and  near  the  equator  ; on  which  journey  he  made 
the  first  ascents  of  Chimborazo,  Sincholagua,  An- 
tisana,  Cayambe,  and  Cotocachi.  In  1892  ap- 
peared his  Travels  Among  the  Great  Andes  of  the 
Equator,  with  its  Supplementary  Appendix,  and  How 
to  Use  the  Aneroid  Barometer.  The  Royal  Geo- 
graphical Society  awarded  him  the  Patron’s 
(285; 


286 


EDWARD  WHYMPER 


medal,  and  the  King  of  Italy  decorated  him  a 
Chevalier  of  the  Order  of  Saints  Maurice  and 
Lazarus.  Some  of  his  best  writings,  accompanied 
with  wood-cuts  engraved  by  himself,  have  ap- 
peared as  magazine  articles,  especially  in  the 
Leisure  Hour . 

THE  TOP  OF  CHIMBORAZO. 

We  had  scarcely  mounted  more  than  a thousand  feet 
above  our  third  camp,  and  as  it  was  certain  that  we 
could  not  reach  the  summit  that  day,  we  came  down 
again,  holding  ourselves  in  readiness  to  start  again  the 
following  morning. 

I started  at  5.40  a.m.,  January  4,  on  a very  fine  and 
nearly  cloudless  morning.  We  followed  the  track  made 
yesterday,  and  benefited  by  the  steps  which  had  been 
cut  in  the  snow.  At  first  the  line  of  ascent  was  on  the 
southern  side  of  the  mountain,  but  after  the  height  of 
18,500  feet  had  been  attained,  we  commenced  to  bear 
round  to  the  west,  and  mounted  spirally,  arriving  on 
the  plateau  at  the  summit  from  a northerly  direction. 

The  ascent  was  mainly  over  snow,  and  entirely  so 
after  19,500  feet  had  been  passed.  Up  to  nearly  20,- 
000  feet  it  was  in  good  condition,  and  we  sank  in  but 
slightly,  and  progressed  at  a reasonable  rate.  Until 
11  a.m.  we  had  met  with  no  great  difficulties,  and  up  to 
that  time  had  experienced  fine  weather,  with  a good 
deal  of  sunshine. 

We  were  now  20,000  feet  high,  and  the  summit 
seemed  within  our  grasp.  We  could  see  the  great  pla- 
teau which  is  at  the  top  of  the  mountain,  and  the  two 
fine  snowy  domes,  one  on  its  northern  and  the  other  on 
its  southern  side.  But,  alas  ! the  sky  became  clouded 
all  over,  the  wind  rose,  and  we  entered  upon  a large 
tract  of  exceedingly  soft  snow,  which  could  not  be 
traversed  in  the  ordinary  way,  and  it  was  found  neces- 
sary to  flog  every  yard  of  it  down,  and  then  to  crawl 
over  it  on  all-fours.  The  ascent  of  the  last  thousand 
feet  occupied  more  than  five  hours,  and  it  was  5 p.m. 
before  we  reached  the  summit  of  the  higher  of  the  two 
domes  of  Chimborazo. — From  The  Ascent  of  Chi?nborazoi 
in  the  Leisure  Hour%  1881 . 


WICLIF,  John  de,  a celebrated  English  patriot 
and  religious  reformer,  born  in  Spreswell  (sup- 
posed to  be  either  Hipswell  or  Barford),  near 
Richmond,  Yorkshire,  about  1330;  died  at  Lut- 
terworth, Leicestershire,  December  31,  1384. 
His  name,  variously  written  Wycliffe,  Wicklif, 
etc.,  is  Wiclif  in  official  documents  of  his  time. 
At  the  age  of  fifteen  he  entered  Oxford,  then  in 
its  glory,  with  at  one  time  the  astonishing  number 
of  30,000  students.  About  1360,  he  became  Master 
of  Balliol  College;  and  for  a while  was  royal 
chaplain.  His  life  was  full  of  work  and  stirring 
events,  in  his  support  of  the  King  against  Papal 
claims,  his  publishing  the  principles  of  the  Refor- 
mation (anterior  to  other  reformers),  opposing  the 
ecclesiastical  corruptions,  sending  forth  preachers 
to  the  people,  and  giving  to  the  people  the  Bible 
in  their  own  tongue — the  translation  by  him  and 
his  helpers,  from  the  Latin  Vulgate,  having  been 
finished  about  the  time  of  his  death.  He  was  re- 
peatedly arraigned  for  heresy,  and,  finally  pro- 
hibited from  teaching  in  the  university,  retired  to 
his  rectory  of  Lutterworth.  His  buried  remains, 
by  order  of  the  rival  pope,  Clement  VIIL,  were 
disinterred,  burned,  and  the  ashes  cast  into  the 
Swift,  a branch  of  the  Avon  River.  In  the  follow- 
ing extracts  from  his  polemical  writings  the  an- 
cient spelling  is  modernized. 

(287) 


288 


JOHN  DE  H JCLIF 


THE  SCRIPTURES. 

I have  learned  by  experience  the  truth  of  what  you 
say  (with  reference  to  my  appeal  to  the  Scriptures). 
The  chief  cause,  beyond  doubt,  of  the  existing  state  of 
things  is  our  want  of  faith  in  Holy  Scripture.  We  do 
not  sincerely  believe  in  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  or  we 
should  abide  by  the  authority  of  His  Word,  in  particu- 
lar that  of  the  Evangelists,  as  of  infinitely  greater 
weight  than  any  other.  Inasmuch  as  it  is  the  will  of 
the  Holy  Spirit  that  our  attention  should  not  be  dis- 
persed over  a large  number  of  objects,  but  concen- 
trated on  one  sufficient  source  of  instruction,  it  is  His 
pleasure  that  the  books  of  the  Old  and  New  Law  should 
be  read  and  studied , and  that  men  should  not  be  taken 
up  with  other  books,  which,  true  as  they  may  be,  and 
containing  even  Scripture  truth,  as  they  may  by  im- 
plication, are  not  to  be  confided  in  without  caution 
and  limitation.  Hence  St.  Austin  often  enjoins  on  his 
readers  not  to  place  any  faith  in  his  word  or  writings, 
except  in  so  far  as  they  have  their  foundation  in  the 
Scriptures,  wherein,  as  he  often  sayeth,  all  truth,  either 
directly  or  implicitly,  is  contained.  Of  course  we  should 
judge  in  this  manner  with  reference  to  the  writings  of 
other  holy  doctors,  and  much  more  with  reference  to 
the  writings  of  the  Roman  Church,  and  of  her  doctors 
in  these  later  times.  If  we  follow  this  rule,  the  Script- 
ures will  be  held  in  due  respect.  . . . 

We  ought  to  believe  in  the  authority  of  no  man,  un- 
less he  say  the  Word  of  God.  It  is  impossible  that 
any  word  or  deed  of  the  Christian  should  be  of  equal 
authority  with  Holy  Scripture.  The  right  understand- 
ing of  Holy  Scripture  is  being  taught  to  us  by  the  Holy 
Ghost  just  as  the  Scriptures  were  opened  to  the  Apos- 
tles by  Christ.  But  while  Holy  Scripture  includes 
in  itself  all  truth,  partly  mediately,  partly  immediate- 
ly, reason  is  indispensable  to  the  right  understand- 
ing. ... 

The  whole  Scripture  is  one  word  of  God ; also  the 
whole  Law  of  Christ  is  one  perfect  word  proceeding 
from  the  mouth  of  God  ; it  is,  therefore,  not  permitted 


JOHN  DE  WICLIF  28$ 

to  sever  the  Holy  Scripture,  but  to  allege  it  in  its  in- 
tegrity according  to  the  sense  of  the  author.  . . . 

If  God’s  word  is  the  life  of  the  world,  and  every 
word  of  God  is  the  life  of  the  human  soul,  how  may  any 
Antichrist,  for  dread  of  God,  take  it  away  from  us  that 
be  Christian  men,  and  thus  suffer  the  people  to  die  for 
hunger  in  heresy  and  blasphemy  of  men’s  laws,  that 
corrupteth  and  slayeth  the  soul  ? . . . 

The  fiend  seeketh  many  ways  to  mar  men  in  belief  and 
to  stop  them  by  saying  that  no  books  are  belief.  For 
if  thou  speakest  of  the  Bible,  then  Antichrist’s  clerks 
say,  How  provest  thou  that  it  is  Holy  Writ  more  than  an- 
other written  book  ? Therefore  men  must  use  caution, 
and  ask  the  question  whether  Christ  left  His  Gospel 
here  in  order  to  comfort  His  Church.  And  if  they  say 
that  He  did,  ask  them  which  are  these  Gospels  ? These 
we  call  Holy  Writ.  But  as  Christian  men  should  speak 
plainly  to  Antichrist,  we  say  that  Holy  Writ  is  com- 
monly taken  in  three  manners.  On  the  first  manner 
Christ  Himself  is  called  in  the  Gospel  Holy  Writ.  On 
the  second  manner  Holy  Writ  is  called  the  Truth,  and 
this  truth  may  not  fail.  On  the  third  manner  Holy 
Writ  is  the  name  given  to  Xhe  books  that  are  written 
and  made  of  ink  and  parchment.  And  this  speech  is 
not  so  proper  as  the  first  and  second.  But  we  take  by 
belief  that  the  second  Writ,  the  truth  written  in  the 
Book  of  Life,  is  Holy  Writ,  and  God  says  it.  This  we 
know  by  belief,  and  this  one  belief  makes  us  certain  that 
these  truths  are  Holy  Writ.  Thus  though  Holy  Writ, 
on  the  third  manner,  be  burnt  or  cast  in  the  sea,  Holy 
Writ  on  the  second  manner,  may  not  fail,  as  Christ 
sayeth. — Buddensieg’s  John  Wiclif's  Life  and  Writings. 


WIELAND,  Christoph  Martin,  a German 
poet,  born  at  Oberholzheim,  Swabia,  September 
3,  1733;  died  at  Weimar,  January  20,  1813.  He 
composed  German  and  Latin  verses  in  his  twelfth 
year;  six  years  later  he  published  Ten  Moral  Let- 
ters, and  a poem,  Anti-Ovid.  After  study  at  Tu- 
bingen, his  epic  on  Arminius  brought  him  into 
association  with  Bodmer  of  Zurich.  He  trans- 
lated twenty-two  of  Shakespeare’s  plays  (1762-66), 
In  1769  he  became  Professor  of  Philosophy  at 
Erfurt;  and  later  preceptor  of  the  Grand-Duke 
Charles  Augustus,  with  title  of  Councillor.  His 
collected  works  are  voluminous,  consisting  of 
poems,  novels,  and  satires  in  verse  and  prose. 
The  Geschichte  der  Abderiten  (1774)  has  been  trans- 
lated into  English  as  The  Republic  of  Fools  (1861). 
His  principal  poetic  work  was  an  epic,  Oberon 
(1780),  a canto  of  which,  with  an  ethical  defence  of 
Wieland,  is  in  Longfellow’s  Poetry  of  Europe.  The 
following  extracts,  from  W.  Taylor’s  translation 
(1829),  are  curiously  suggestive  in  form,  though 
not  in  poetic  genius,  of  Tenn}^son’s  later  Idyls  of 
the  King.  Geron  (Gyron)  the  Courteous  was  the 
favorite  romance  of  Francis  I.  of  France.  The 
motto  on  Geron’s  sword  was,  “ Loyalty  surpasses 
all,  as  falsity  disgraces  all.” 

GERON  THE  COURTEOUS. 

A purpled  canopy  o’erhung  the  seat 
Of  Arthur  and  his  queen  ; an  ivory  stool 


mi  uBlwtn 
IF  THE 

mmm  of  iUM» 


CHRISTOPH  MARTIN  WIELAND 


29] 


Was  pla;ed  between  them  for  the  worthy  Branor. 

When  these  were  seated,  others  took  their  places, 

In  order  due,  beside  the  spacious  board. 

Now  twenty  youths  in  pewter  dishes  brought 
The  steaming  food,  and  twenty  others  waited 
At  the  rich  side-board,  where  from  silver  ewers 
Streamed  ale,  mead,  wine  ; and  trumpets  shook  the  hall, 
As  often  as  the  two-eared  cup  went  round.  . . . 

King  Arthur  took  the  old  man’s  hand,  and  said  : 

“ Until  to-day  my  eyes  have  ne’er  beheld, 

Sir  Branor,  one  so  stout  and  merciful  : 

God  help  me,  but  I should  have  liked  to  know 
The  fathers  who  begot  such  sons  as  these.” 

Him  the  old  knight  replied  to  in  this  wise  : 

“ Sire  King,  I’ve  lived  a hundred  years  and  more ; 

Many  a good  man  upon  his  nurse’s  lap 

I’ve  seen,  and  many  a better  helped  to  bury. 

As  yet  there  is  no  lack  of  doughty  knights, 

Or  lovely  ladies  worthy  of  their  service  ; 

But  men  like  those  of  yore  I see  not  now, 

So  full  of  manhood,  firmness,  frankness,  sense, 

To  honor,  right,  and  truth,  so  tied  and  steadfast, 

With  hand  and  heart,  and  countenance,  so  open, 

So  without  guile,  as  were  King  Meliad, 

Hector  the  Brown,  and  Danayn  the  Red, 

And  my  friend  Geron,  still  surnamed  the  Courteous.” 


Branor  continued  thus  : “At  that  time  lived 
In  Brittany  a noble  knight,  surnamed 
Danayn  the  Red,  who  dwelt  at  Malouen  ; 

Geron  the  Courteous  was  his  constant  comrade 
And  dearest  friend  ; together  they  had  sworn 
The  bond  to  die  for  one  another,  and 
Their  fast  affection  was  become  a proverb. 

The  dame  of  Malouen,  the  wife  of  Danayn, 

Was  in  all  Brittany  the  fairest  woman.  . . . 

They  travelled  for  adventures  to  the  courts 
Of  princes — where  at  tournaments  and  skurries 
Fame  could  be  earned  ; and  when  they  were  come  back 
To  Malouen,  Sir  Geron  kept  his  way, 

Renewed  the  silent  covenant  with  his  eyes, 

Vol_  XXIV.— IQ 


CHRISTOPH  MARTIN  WIELAND 

So  that  who  saw  him  always  would  have  fancied 
The  lovely  dame  of  Malouen  to  him 
Was  nothing  more  than  any  other  woman. 

Unluckily,  the  lovely  lady’s  heart 
Was  not  so  guarded  as  his  own.  She  thought 
At  the  first  glance  that  Geron  was  the  man, 

Above  all  other  men,  to  whom  a lady 
Could  not  refuse  the  recompense  of  her  love. 

And  lo  ! it  somehow  happened, 

That,  just  as  Geron  was  approaching  her, 

He  brushed  against  the  low  wall  of  the  well, 

Where  he  had  piled  his  weapons  on  each  other, 

And  the  good  sword  slid  down  into  the  water. 

Now,  when  he  heard  the  splash,  he  quickly  leaves 
The  lovely  lady,  runs  to  save  the  sword, 

And  draws  it  out,  and  wipes  it  dry  ; 

And,  as  he  looked  along  it  narrowly 
To  see  if  ’twas  uninjured,  his  eye  caught 
The  golden  letters  on  the  blade  inscribed 
By  Hector’s  order.  As  he  read,  he  trembled. 

He  reads  again  ; it  was  as  had  the  words 
Never  before  impressed  him.  All  the  spell 
At  once  was  broke. 

He  stands  with  the  good  sword 
Bare  in  his  hand,  and  sinks  into  himself  : 

“ Where  am  I ? God  in  heaven  ! what  a deed 
I was  come  here  to  do  ! " And  his  knees  tottered 
Now  at  the  thought.  The  swrord  still  in  his  hand, 

He  on  the  margin  of  the  well  sat  down, 

His  back  toward  the  lady,  full  of  sorrow, 

And  sinking  from  one  sad  thought  to  another. 

Now  when  the  lady,  who  so  late  ago 
Beheld  him  blithe  and  gay,  thus  suddenly 
Perceived  him  falling  in  strange  melancholy, 

She  was  alarmed,  and  knew  not  what  to  think, 

And  came  to  him  with  gentle,  timid  step, 

And  said,  “ What  ails  you,  sir  ; what  are  you  planning  ? n 

Geron,  unheeding  her,  still  bent  his  eyes 
Steadfast  upon  his  sword,  and  made  no  answer. 

She  waited  long,  and,  as  he  gave  her  none, 

She  stepped  still  nearer,  and  with  tenderest  voice 


CHRIST OPM  MARTIN  WI ELAND 


293 


Again  repeated,  “ My  dear  sir,  what  ails  you?’* 

He,  deeply  sighing,  answered,  “What  I ail — 

May  God  in  heaven  have  mercy  on  my  soul  ! 
Against  my  brother  Danayn  I have  sinned, 

And  am  not  worthy  now  to  live.”  He  spoke 
And  once  again  began  to  eye  his  sword, 

Then  said,  with  broken  voice  : “ Thou  trusty  blade, 
Into  whose  hands  art  thou  now  fallen  ? He 
Was  quite  another  man  who  used  to  wield  thee. 

No  faithless  thought  e’er  came  across  his  heart 
In  his  whole  life.  Forgive  me  : I no  more 
Can  now  deserve  to  wear  thee.  I’ll  avenge 
Both  thee  and  him,  who  once  hoped  better  of  me 
When  to  my  keeping  he  intrusted  thee.” 

And  now  he  raised  his  arm  ; and,  ere  the  lady, 
Helpless  from  terror,  could  attempt  to  hinder, 

He  ran  his  body  through  and  through,  then  drew 
The  weapon  out,  and  would  have  given  himself 
Another  stab,  but  that  the  dame  of  Malouen, 

With  all  the  force  of  love  and  of  despair 
Fell  on  his  arm. 

“ Good  knight,  for  God’s  sake  spare 
Your  precious  life  ; slay  not  yourself,  and  me, 

So  cruelly  for  nothing.” 

“ Lady,”  said  he, 

“ Leave  me  my  will.  I don’t  deserve  to  live, 

And  wish  to  perish,  rather  than  be  false.” 

The  lady  sobbed  aloud,  and  clung  around  him, 

While  this  was  passing,  Danayn  returned.  . . « 

And  as  he  passed  this  forest,  near  the  well 
A shriek  of  woe  assailed  him,  and  he  turned 
His  horse,  to  seek  the  cause — when  lo ! he  saw, 
Stretched  in  his  blood,  Sir  Geron,  bleeding  still ; 
And  by  him  kneeled  alone,  in  speechless  anguish, 
Wringing  her  hands,  the  lady.  Danayn, 

Instead  of  asking  questions,  from  his  horse 
Sprang,  and  proceeded  to  assist  his  friend. 

Geron  refuses  to  accept  relief— 

He  will  not  live — and  to  his  friend  accuses 
Himself  most  bitterly,  hides  nothing  from  him 
But  his  wife's  weakness,  takes  upon  himself 
The  load  of  all  his  guilt,  and,  when  he  thus 


294 


CHRISTOPH  MARTIN  WIELAN r> 


Had  ended  his  confession,  he  held  out 

His  hand,  and  said,  “ Now  then  forgive  me,  brother, 

If  you  are  able.  But,  oh,  let  me  die, 

And  do  not  hate  my  memory  ; for  repentance 
Did  come  before  the  deed.  My  faithlessness 
Was  only  in  my  heart.  Be  my  heart’s  blood 
The  fit  atonement.*’ 

Noble  Danayn 

Conjures  him,  by  their  holy  friendship,  still 
To  live — and  swears  to  him,  that  more  than  ever 
He  now  esteems  and  loves  him.  Overcome 
By  such  affection,  Geron  then  consents 
For  his  dear  friend  to  live. 

— Taylor’s  Historical  Survey  of  German  Poetry. 

THE  PAIN  OF  SEPARATION. 

On  the  marge  of  silent  waters 
Lonely  oft  I sit  and  count, 

In  the  lagging,  sluggish  deep, 

All  the  moments  which  divide  us, 

As  they  lonely  onward  creep. 

My  trembling  feet  then  stray 
Through  valley,  mead,  and  grove, 

I think,  by  night  and  day, 

Of  thee  alone,  my  love. 

At  every  whisper 
From  dusky  grove, 

When  flaps  her  airy  wing 
The  turtle-dove, 

How  beats  my  heart ! 

My  ear  I strain, 

And  when  I list  and  wait, 

Day  after  day — how  great 
Is  then  my  pain  ! 

— Translation  of  A,  Baskerville. 


WILBERFORCE,  Samuel,  an  English  prelate, 
born  at  Broomfield  House,  Clapham,  near  Lon- 
don, September  7,  1805  ; died  at  Dorking,  July 
19,  1 873.  He  was  one  of  the  most  accomplished 
and  influential  debaters  in  the  House  of  Lords. 
Educated  at  Oxford,  he  was  successively  rector 
of  Brightstone,  Archdeacon  of  Surrey  and  chap- 
lain to  Prince  Albert,  Canon  of  Westminster  Ca- 
thedral, Dean  of  Westminster,  Bishop  of  Oxford, 
and  the  same  of  W inchester.  Among  his  writings 
are:  Eucharista  (1839);  Rocky  Island , and  Othe+ 
Parables  (1840) ; History  of  the  Protestant  Episcopal 
Church  hi  America  (1844);  Times  of  Secession  and 
Times  of  Revival  (1863) ; several  volumes  of  Ser* 
mons  and  Essays  (1874). 

“The  scope,”  says  the  Saturday  Review , “of 
Bishop  Wilberforce’s  public  life  as  a churchman, 
though  probably  never  so  precisely  formulated 
by  himself,  was  to  exhibit  among  the  people 
of  England  the  Church  of  England  as  an  insti- 
tution about  which  there  could  be  no  dispute, 
but  which,  existing  as  it  did  in  the  unquestionable 
order  of  things,  had  to  be  improved  and  made  the 
best  of,  for  the  sake,  not  only  of  itself,  but  of  the 
nation  within  which  it  ministered.  In  every  de- 
tail a keen  reformer,  he  recommended  his  projects 
of  reform  not  by  the  defects,  but  by  the  theoretic 
oerfection  of  the  institution  which  he  was  labor- 
ing to  improve.” 


296 


SAMUEL  WILBERFORCE 


USE  AND  MISUSE  OF  SYMBOLS. 

We  find,  then,  the  Early  Church  developing  naturally 
its  invisible  vitality  in  certain  outward  forms  and  sym- 
bols. These  when  examined  closely  prove  to  be  singu- 
larly simple  and  full  of  life  ; to  be  fit  for  all  times  and 
countries  ; to  point  all  attention  from  themselves  to 
the  truths  of  which  they  are  the  shadow.  They  seem 
of  themselves  to  proclaim,  even  aloud,  that  they  were  the 
offspring  of  a vigorous,  healthy,  loving,  believing  age, 
when — not  without  the  direct  guiding  of  the  One  Spirit 
— true  faith  and  hearty  love  breathed  out  their  own 
power  into  such  holy  forms.  But  as  the  Church  lives 
on,  the  growth  of  outward  symbols  still  continues  ; and 
as  they  multiply,  a general  change  comes  over  them  ; 
still  for  a season  they  proceed  from  loving  hearts,  and 
from  imaginative  spirits,  stirred  to  their  lowest  depths 
by  the  breath  of  mighty  truths  ; but  they  are  less  sim- 
ple ; less  meet  for  universal  adaptation  ; fitting  rather 
certain  persons,  certain  modes  of  life,  or  certain  na- 
tions, than  man  in  his  simplicity.  Yet  another  change 
may  in  a while  be  felt  : and  soon  the  outward  symbol 
bears  the  stamp  of  this  mingled  parentage — nay,  in 
very  many  symbols  the  shadows  of  the  error  mark  the 
fixed,  external  portrait  more  deeply  than  the  lines  of 
truth.  This  age  is  to  be  known  by  the  abundance  and 
the  splendor  of  its  outward  symbols  ; by  their  tendency 
to  set  forth  themselves  rather  than  the  truths  for  which 
they  ought  to  witness  , to  draw  to  themselves  admiring 
eyes,  even  from  the  v^ry  truths  of  which  they  still  pro- 
fess to  speak.  They  become  indeed  idols  (ciSaAa),  in- 
stead of  media  for  revealing  God.  Full  of  peril  is  such 
a time,  when  holy  aspirations  are  so  wedded  to  the 
earth  ; fuller  still  ;o  that  which  follows  ; for  error,  ever 
productive  after  its  kind,  here  by  the  doubtful  symbol 
propagates  itself  and  men  are  drawn  away  from  Christ 
by  that  which  professes  to  declare  Him. 

But  to  this  period  succeeds  another  which  contents 
itself  with  maintaining  and  employing  these  creations 
of  preceding  ages.  And  this  it  may  do  until  all  is  lost ; 
until  the  Divine  Gift  of  the  living  Spirit  is  overlaid  by 


SAMUEL  IVILBERFORCE 


297 


these  cumbrous  embodiments  of  mingled  truth  and 
error  ; until  formality  and  utter  death  settle  over  all 
things.  Or  it  may  be  that  at  such  a time,  God’s  great 
mercy  raises  up  some  champions  of  His  truth  who  shall 
boldly  break  in  upon  the  charmed  circle,  dissolve  at 
once  the  foul  enchantment,  and  restore  all  the  mis- 
shaped and  monstrous  images  around  them  to  the  sim- 
plicity of  their  primeval  forms. 

And  what,  after  such  a time,  is  the  attempt  to  re- 
create the  outward  forms  of  earlier,  and  it  may  be, 
darker  days  ? What  is  it  in  any  case  but  ignorantly  to 
go  against  the  universal  law  of  being;  and  it  may  be, 
to  bring  back  forms  which  have  been  at  once  the  con- 
sequence and  cause  of  former  wanderings  ? 


WILCOX,  Ella  (Wheeler),  an  American 
poet,  born  at  Johnstown  Centre,  Wis.,  about  1845. 
She  was  educated  at  the  University  of  Wisconsin. 
At  an  early  age  she  began  to  write  for  newspapers 
and  periodicals.  She  has  published  Drops  of  Wa • 
ter  ( 1872);  Maurine(  1875);  Shells  { 1883);  Poems  of 
Passion  (1883);  Mai  Momlle , a novel  (1885)  ; Poems 
vf  Pleasure  (1888);  A Double  life , a novel  (1891); 
How  Salvator  Won,  a poem  for  recitation  (1891); 
Sweet  Danger , a novel  (1892);  Men , Women  and  Emo- 
tion, forty-five  chapters  of  advice  to  married  folks 
(1893);  Song  of  the  Sandwich,  a comic  poem  (1893) ; 
Was  it  Suicide  ? a collection  of  stories  (1893). 

The  passionateness  on  which  she  seems  to  pride 
herself  is  really  less  poetic,  as  well  as  less  woman- 
ly, than  her  calmer  song.  When  she  writes  thus, 
for  instance,  she  strikes  an  obviously  false  note : 

“ She  touches  my  cheek,  and  I quiver— 

I tremble  with  exquisite  pains ; 

She  sighs — like  an  overcharged  river 
My  blood  rushes  on  through  my  veins  ; 

She  smiles— and  in  mad  tiger  fashion, 

As  a she-tiger  fondles  her  own, 

I clasp  her  with  fierceness  and  passion, 

And  kiss  her  with  shudder  and  groan.'* 

This  is  not  the  passion  of  Rossetti  or  Browning, 
nor  even  of  Gautier  and  Baudelaire ; it  is  a wom- 
an’s crude  imitation  of  these  But  when  Mrs. 

(298) 


ELLA  WILCOX 


299 


Wilcox  writes  simply  and  calmly,  keeping  on  her 

own  ground  of  life  and  experience,  she  is  strong, 

as  in  the  really  fine  poem  Love  s Coming . 

love’s  coming. 

She  had  looked  for  his  coming  as  warriors  come. 

With  the  clash  of  arms,  and  the  bugle’s  call ; 

But  he  came  instead  with  a stealthy  tread, 

Which  she  did  not  hear  at  all. 

She  had  thought  how  his  armor  would  blaze  in  the  sun, 
As  he  rode  like  a prince  to  claim  his  bride  ; 

In  the  sweet,  dim  light  of  the  falling  night 
She  found  him  at  her  side. 

She  had  dreamed  how  the  gaze  of  his  strange,  bold  eye 
Would  wake  her  heart  to  a sudden  glow  ; 

She  found  in  his  face  the  familiar  grace 
Of  a friend  she  used  to  know. 

She  had  dreamed  how  his  coming  would  stir  her  soul, 
As  the  ocean  is  stirred  by  the  wild  storm’s  strife  ; 

He  brought  her  the  balm  of  a heavenly  calm, 

And  a peace  which  crowned  her  life. 

OUR  LIVES. 

Our  lives  are  songs.  God  writes  the  words, 

And  we  set  them  to  music  at  pleasure  ; 

And  the  song  grows  glad,  or  sweet,  or  sad, 

As  we  choose  to  fashion  the  measure. 

We  must  write  the  music,  whatever  the  song, 
Whatever  its  rhyme  or  metre  ; 

And  if  it  is  sad,  we  can  make  it  glad, 

Or  if  sweet,  we  can  make  it  sweeter. 

One  has  a song  that  is  free  and  strong, 

But  the  music  he  writes  is  minor  ; 

And  the  sad,  sad  strain  is  replete  with  pain, 

And  the  singer  becomes  a repiner. 

And  he  thinks  God  gave  him  a dirge-like  ray. 

Nor  knows  that  the  words  are  cheery ; 


3°° 


ELLA  WILCOX 


And  the  song  seems  lonely  and  solemn — only 
Because  the  music  is  dreary. 

And  the  song  of  another  has  through  the  words 
An  under  current  of  sadness  ; 

But  he  sets  it  to  music  of  ringing  chords, 

And  makes  it  a psean  of  gladness. 

So  whether  our  songs  are  sad  or  not, 

We  can  give  the  world  more  pleasure, 

And  better  ourselves,  by  setting  the  words 
To  a glad,  triumphant  measure. 

GHOSTS. 

There  are  ghosts  in  the  room, 

As  I sit  here  alone,  from  the  dark  corners  there 
They  come  out  of  the  gloom. 

And  they  stand  at  my  side,  and  they  lean  on  my  chair. 

There’s  the  ghost  of  a hope 
That  lighted  my  days  with  a fanciful  glow. 

In  her  hand  is  the  rope 

That  strangled  her  life  out.  Hope  was  slain  long  ago. 

But  her  ghost  comes  to-night 
With  its  skeleton  face,  and  expressionless  eyes, 

And  it  stands  in  the  light, 

And  mocks  me,  and  jeers  me  with  sobs  and  with  sighs. 

There’s  the  ghost  of  a joy, 

A frail,  fragile  thing,  and  I prized  it  too  much, 

And  the  hands  that  destroy 
Clasped  it  close,  and  it  died  at  the  withering  touch. 

There’s  the  ghost  of  a love, 

Born  with  joy,  reared  with  Hope,  died  in  pain  and  unrest, 
But  he  towers  above 

All  the  others — this  ghost : yet  a ghost  at  the  best. 

I am  weary,  and  fain 

Would  forget  all  these  dead  : but  the  gibbering  host 
Make  the  struggle  in  vain. 

In  each  shadowy  corner,  there  lurketh  a ghost. 


WILKINSON,  Sir  John  Gardner,  an  English 
traveller  and  Egyptologist,  born  at  Hardendale, 
Westmoreland,  October  5,  1797;  died  October  29, 
1875.  He  was  educated  at  Harrow  and  Oxford. 
He  went  to  Egypt,  where  he  resided  for  twelve 
years,  devoting  himself  to  the  study  of  Egyptology 
in  its  widest  signification.  Returning  to  England 
in  1839,  he  received  the  honor  of  knighthood  ; sub- 
sequently he  travelled  widely  in  various  parts  of 
Europe  and  the  East.  Besides  several  elaborate 
monographs  on  Egyptology,  he  wrote  The  Topog- 
raphy of  Thebes  (1835) ; The  Manners  and  Customs 
of  the  Ancient  Egyptians  (1837-41) ; Modern  Egypt 
and  Thebes  (1843);  The  Architecture  of  Ancient 
Egypt  (1850);  The  Egyptians  in  the  Time  of  the 
Pharaohs  (1857).  He  also  furnished  a valuable 
Dissertation  on  Egypt  to  Rawlinson’s  translation  of 
Herodotus  (i860). 

“ In  the  admirable  work  of  Sir  Gardner  Wilkin- 
son,” sa}^s  A.  H.  Layard,  in  Nineveh  and  Its  Re- 
mains, “ he  has  availed  himself  of  the  paintings, 
sculptures,  and  monuments  of  the  ancient  Egyp- 
tians to  restore  their  manners  and  customs,  and 
to  place  their  public  and  private  life  before  us  as 
fully  as  if  they  still  occupied  the  banks  of  the  Nile.” 

AN  ANCIENT  EGYPTIAN  REPAST. 

While  the  guests  were  entertained  with  music  and  the 
dance,  dinner  was  prepared  ; but  as  it  consisted  of  a 
considerable  number  of  dishes,  and  the  meat  was  killed 


302 


JOHN  GARDNER  WILKINSON 


for  the  occasion,  as  at  the  present  day  in  Eastern  and 
tropical  climates,  some  time  elapsed  before  it  was  put 
upon  the  table.  An  ox,  kid,  wild  goat,  gazelle,  or  an 
oryx,  and  a quantity  of  geese,  ducks,  teal,  quails,  and 
other  birds,  were  generally  selected,  but  mutton  was  ex- 
cluded from  a Theban  table.  Sheep  were  not  killed  for 
the  altar  or  the  table,  but  they  abounded  in  Egypt,  and 
even  at  Thebes,  and  large  flocks  were  kept  for  their 
wool,  particularly  in  the  neighborhood  of  Memphis. 
Beef  and  goose  constituted  the  principal  part  of  the 
animal  food  throughout  Egypt ; and  by  a prudent  fore- 
sight, in  a country  possessing  neither  extensive  pasture- 
lands  nor  great  abundance  of  cattle,  the  cow  was  held 
sacred,  and  consequently  forbidden  to  be  eaten.  Thus 
the  risk  of  exhausting  the  stock  was  prevented,  and  a 
constant  supply  of  oxen  was  kept  for  the  table  and  for 
agricultural  purposes.  A similar  fear  of  diminishing  the 
number  of  sheep,  so  valuable  for  their  wool,  led  to  a 
preference  to  such  meats  as  beef  and  goose. 

A considerable  quantity  of  meat  was  served  up  at 
these  repasts,  to  which  strangers  were  invited,  as  among 
people  of  the  East  at  the  present  day.  An  endless 
succession  of  vegetables  was  required  on  all  occasions  ; 
and  when  dining  in  private,  dishes  composed  chiefly  of 
them  were  in  greater  request  than  joints,  even  at  the 
tables  of  the  rich  ; and  consequently  the  Israelites,  who 
by  their  long  residence  there  had  acquired  similar 
habits,  regretted  them  equally  with  the  meat  and  fish 
of  Egypt.  Their  mode  of  dining  was  very  similar  to 
that  now  adopted  at  Cairo,  and  throughout  the  East ; 
the  party  sitting  around  a table,  and  dipping  their 
bread  into  a dish  placed  in  the  centre,  removed  by  a 
sign  made  by  the  host,  and  succeeded  by  others,  whose 
rotation  depends  on  established  rule,  and  whose  num- 
ber was  predetermined  according  to  the  size  of  the  party 
or  the  quality  of  the  guests. 

As  is  the  custom  in  Egypt  and  other  hot  climates  at 
the  present  day,  they  cooked  the  meat  as  soon  as  killed, 
with  the  same  view  of  keeping  it  tender  which  makes 
northern  people  keep  it  until  decomposition  is  begin- 
ning. And  this  explains  the  order  of  Joseph  to  slay 
and  make  ready  for  his  brethren  to  dine  with  him  the 


JOHN  GARDNER  WILKINSON  303 

same  day  at  noon.  As  soon,  therefore,  as  this  had 
been  done,  and  the  joints  were  all  ready,  the  kitchen 
presented  an  animated  scene,  and  the  cooks  were  busy 
in  their  several  departments.  Other  servants  took 
charge  of  the  pastry,  which  the  bakers  or  confection- 
ers had  made  for  the  dinner-table  ; and  this  depart- 
ment appears  to  have  been  even  more  varied  than  that 
of  the  cook.  That  dinner  was  served  up  at  midday 
may  be  inferred  from  the  invitation  given  by  Joseph  to 
his  brethren  ; but  it  is  probable  that,  like  the  Romans, 
they  also  ate  supper  in  the  evening,  as  is  still  the  cus- 
tom in  the  East. 

The  table  was  much  the  same  as  that  of  the  present 
day  in  Egypt  ; a small  stool  supporting  a round  tray, 
on  which  the  dishes  were  placed  ; but  it  differed  from 
this  in  having  its  circular  summit  fixed  on  a pillar,  or 
leg,  which  was  often  in  the  form  of  a man — generally  a 
captive — who  supported  the  slab  upon  his  head  ; the 
whole  being  of  stone,  or  some  hard  wood.  On  this 
the  dishes  were  placed,  together  with  loaves  of  bread. 
It  was  not  generally  covered  with  any  linen,  but,  like 
the  Greek  table,  was  washed  with  a sponge  or  napkin 
after  the  dishes  were  removed.  One  or  two  guests 
generally  sat  at  a table  ; though  from  the  mention  of 
persons  seated  in  rows  according  to  rank,  it  has  been 
supposed  the  tables  were  occasionally  of  an  oblong 
shape  ; as  may  have  have  been  the  case  when  the 
brethren  of  Joseph  “ sat  before  him,  the  first-born  ac- 
cording to  his  youth,”  Joseph  eating  alone  at  another 
table,  where  “ they  set  on  for  him  by  himself.”  But 
even  if  round,  they  might  still  sit  according  to  rank, 
one  place  being  always  the  post  of  .honor,  even  at  the 
present  day,  at  the  round  table  of  Egypt.  The  guests 
sat  on  the  ground,  or  on  stools  and  chairs  ; and  having 
neither  knives  nor  forks,  nor  any  substitute  for  them 
answering  to  the  chop-sticks  of  the  Chinese,  they  ate 
with  their  fingers,  like  the  modern  Asiatics,  and  invari- 
ably with  the  right  hand  ; nor  did  the  Jews  and  Etrus- 
cans, though  they  had  forks  for  other  purposes,  use 
any  at  table.  Spoons  were  introduced  when  required 
for  soup  or  other  liquids.  The  Egyptian  spoons  were 
of  various  forms  and  sizes  ; they  were  principally  of 


3*4 


JOHN  GARDNER  WILKINSON 


ivory,  bone,  wood,  or  bronze  and  other  metals  ; many 
were  ornamented  with  the  lotus-flower. 

The  Egyptians  washed  after,  as  well  as  before,  dinner 
— an  invariable  custom  throughout  the  East,  as  among 
the  Greeks,  Romans,  Hebrews,  and  others.  It  was  also 
a custom  of  the  Egyptians,  during  and  after  their  sup- 
pers, to  introduce  a wooden  image  of  Osiris,  from  one 
foot  and  a half  to  three  feet  in  height,  in  the  form  of  a 
human  mummy,  standing  erect  or  lying  on  a bier,  and 
to  show  it  to  each  of  the  guests,  warning  him  of  his 
mortality  and  the  transitory  nature  of  human  pleas- 
ures. He  was  reminded  that  some  day  he  would  be 
like  that  figure  ; that  men  ought  to  love  one  another  ; 
to  avoid  those  evils  which  tend  to  make  them  consider 
life  long  when  in  reality  it  was  too  short  ; and,  while 
enjoying  the  blessings  of  this  world,  to  bear  in  mind 
that  their  existence  was  precarious  ; and  that  death, 
which  all  must  be  prepared  to  meet,  must  eventually 
close  their  earthly  career.  Thus  while  the  guests  were 
permitted,  and  even  encouraged,  to  indulge  in  conviv- 
iality, the  pleasures  of  the  table,  and  the  mirth  so  con- 
genial to  their  lively  disposition,  they  were  exhorted  to 
put  a certain  degree  of  restraint  upon  their  conduct. 
And  though  this  sentiment  was  perverted  by  other 
people,  and  used  as  an  incentive  to  present  excess,  it 
was  perfectly  consistent  with  the  ideas  of  the  Egyptians 
to  be  reminded  that  this  life  was  only  a lodging  or  inn 
on  their  way  ; and  that  their  existence  here  was  the 
preparation  for  a future  state. 

After  dinner  music  and  dancing  were  resumed  ; hired 
men  and  women  displayed  feats  of  agility.  The  most 
usual  games  within  doors  were  odd-and-even,  draughts, 
and  mora.  The  game  of  mora  was  common  in  ancient 
as  well  as  modern  times  ; it  was  played  by  two  persons, 
who  each  simultaneously  threw  out  the  fingers  of  one 
hand,  while  one  party  guessed  the  numbers  of  both. 
They  were  said,  in  Latin,  viicare  digitis  j and  this  game, 
so  common  among  the  lower  order  of  Italians,  existed 
about  four  thousand  years  ago,  in  the  reigns  of  the  Osir- 
tasens. — Manners  and  Customs  of  the  Ancient  Egyptians . 


WILKINSON,  William  Cleaver,  an  Amer- 
ican literary  critic,  born  at  Westford,  Vt.,  October 
19,  1833.  He  was  graduated  at  the  University  of 
Vermont  in  1857,  and  at  the  Rochester,  N.  Y., 
Theological  School  in  1859,  when  he  entered  the 
Baptist  ministry.  In  1872  he  became  Professor 
of  Homiletics  in  the  theological  department  of 
Rochester  University.  His  published  volumes 
are,  besides  Greek  and  Latin  text-books,  The  Dance 
of  M oder n Society  (1869)  ; A Free  Lance  in  the  Field 
of  Life  and  Letters  (1874),  containing  admirable 
critiques  on  George  Eliot,  Bryant,  Erasmus,  etc., 
and  trenchant  reviews  of  Lowell’s  prose  and 
poetry ; Webster  : an  Ode  (1882)  ; Edzvin  Arnold  as 
Poetizer  and  Paganizer  (1885) ; The  Baptist  Prin- 
ciple, an  examination  of  The  Light  of  Asia,  and  sev- 
eral text-books  on  Greek,  Latin,  and  German  lit- 
erature for  the  Chautauqua  Literary  and  Scien- 
tific Circle. 

THE  BUSINESS  OF  POETRY. 

Mr.  Longfellow  comes  nearest,  among  our  American 
literary  men,  to  being  exclusively  a poet.  But  Mr. 
Longfellow  gave  twenty  years  of  his  prime  to  the  duties 
of  an  arduous  college  professorship,  and  we  have  good 
testimony  that  he  did  not  shirk  those  duties  as  is  the 
privilege  of  genius  and  of  fame.  The  fact  remains,  that 
in  the  United  States  division  of  labor  has  not  yet  reached 
the  point  of  allowing  our  poets  to  devote  themselves 
exclusively  to  poetry.  The  newness  of  our  civilization 


306  WILLIAM  CLEAVER  WILKINSON 

continues  to  exact  of  us  all  a roundabout  savoir  fairt 
hostile  to  the  highest  perfection  of  those  exclusive  and 
meditative  habits  which  alone  enable  the  poet  to  secrete, 
in  fruitful  tranquillity,  the  precious  substance  of  his 
verse,  and  silently  and  slowly  crystallize  it  into  supreme 
and  ideal  forms.  We  remember,  some  years  ago,  meet- 
ing a solid  English  tradesman,  as  he  looked,  driving  his 
solid  English  horse,  before  a two-wheeled  wagon,  at  a 
ringing  trot  around  and  down  a sloping  curve  of  the 
solid  English  road,  on  the  Isle  of  Wight,  in  the  neighbor- 
hood of  Mr.  Tennyson’s  residence.  The  ruddy  roast 
beef  of  the  man’s  complexion,  his  brown-stout  corpu- 
lence, and  the  perfect  worldliness  of  his  whole  appear- 
ance, whimsically  suggested  Mr.  Tennyson’s  poetry  to 
us  under  the  circumstances.  We  could  not  resist  the 
temptation  to  stop  him,  and  enjoy  the  sensation  of  in- 
quiring the  way  to  Mr.  Tennyson’s  house  of  such  a man. 
“if,  now,  you  could  tell  me  his  business?”  responded 
he.  Tennyson’s  business ! We  were  well-nigh  dum- 
founded.  We  came  near  being  in  the  case  of  Mr.  John 
Smith,  that  absent-minded  man  who  could  not  recall  his 
own  name  on  challenge  at  the  post-office  window.  We 
recovered  our  presence  of  mine!,  however,  and  told  our 
friend  he  “ made  verses,”  we  believed.  “Ah,  yes;  the 
Queen’s  poet— Tennyson — that’s  the  name.  Yes  ; he 
makes  verses — you’re  right — that’s  his  business  ; and 
very  clever  at  it  he  is,  too,  they  say.”  This  was  the 
Old  World.  It  could  hardly  have  been  the  New. 

And  yet  poetry,  certainly  as  much  as  any  other  voca- 
tion of  genius,  is  jealous  of  a divided  devotion.  Nothing 
short  of  the  whole  man,  for  his  whole  life,  will  satisfy 
her  extortionate  claim.  It  will  nvt  even  do,  generally, 
for  the  poet  to  indulge  himself  in  coquetting  with  prose. 
The  “ poet’s  garland  and  singing-robes  ” are  not  an  in- 
vestiture to  be  lightly  donned  and  doffed  at  will.  To 
wear  them  most  gracefully  one  must  wear  them  habitu- 
ally. 

The  difference  between  poetry  and  prose  is  an  essen- 
tial difference.  It  can  hardly  be  defined,  but  it  may  be 
illustrated.  Poetry  differs  from  prose,  in  part,  as  run- 
ning differs  from  walking.  There  is  motion  in  both 
running  and  walking  ; but  in  running  the  motion  is 


WILLIAM  CLEAVER  WILKINSON  307 

continuous,  while  in  walking  the  motion  is  a series 
of  advances,  separated  by  intervals,  less  or  more  appre- 
ciable, of  rest.  Poetry  runs — prose  walks.  Again,  poe- 
try differs  from  prose  as  singing  differs  from  talking. 
The  difference  between  singing  and  talking  is  not  that 
singing  is  musical  and  talking  not  musical.  The  differ- 
ence is  that  singing  is  musical  in  one  way,  and  talking 
musical,  if  musical,  in  another.  Poetry  sings — prose 
talks.  Each  has  a rhythm  ; but  the  rhythm  of  each  is 
its  own. 

But  there  is  yet  a finer  distinction  between  poetry 
and  prose  than  has  thus  been  illustrated — a finer  one, 
we  mean,  this  side  of  the  finest  one  of  all,  which  is  far 
too  fine  to  be  expressed  in  any  “ matter-moulded  forms 
of  speech.”  There  is  a certain  curiously  subtle  idiom 
of  expression  belonging  to  poetry,  and  another  equally 
subtle  idiom  of  expression  belonging  to  prose.  These 
two  idioms  of  expression  are  as  palpably  distinct  from 
each  other  as  are  the  several  idioms  of  different  lan- 
guages. They  defy  definition  ; they  elude  analysis. 
They  do  not  depend  on  choice  of  words,  they  do  not 
depend  on  collocation  of  words,  although  they  depend 
partly  on  both  these  things.  A man  whose  talent  was 
that  of  prose-writer  might  make  faultless  verse  from 
a vocabulary  chosen  out  of  the  purest  poetry  of  the 
language,  and  there  should  not  be  one  poetical  line 
in  his  work  from  beginning  to  end.  On  the  other  hand, 
there  is  hardly  an  intractable  word  in  the  language  that 
a true  poet  could  not  weave  into  his  verse  without  harm 
to  the  poetic  effect.  In  the  main,  the  diction  of  a true 
poet  and  the  diction  of  a good  prose  writer  will  be 
identical.  The  order  of  the  poet  will  not  vary  violently 
from  the  order  of  the  prose-writer.  Their  subject  may 
be  the  same,  and  even  the  mode  of  conception,  and  the 
figures  of  speech.  All  these  points  of  coincidence  be- 
tween poetry  and  prose  may  exist  ; they  generally  do 
exist,  and,  notwithstanding  them  all,  the  inviolate  idiom 
of  poetic  expression  and  the  inviolate  idiom  of  prose 
expression  remain  uninterchangeably  distinct.-—^  Fret 
Lance . 


Vol.  xxiv.— ao 


WILLARD,  Emma  Hart,  an  American  edu- 
cator, historian,  and  poet,  born  at  New  Berlin, 
Conn.,  February  23,  1787;  died  at  Troy,  N.  Y., 
April  15,  1870.  She  was  educated  in  the  Academy 
in  Hartford,  Conn.,  and  at  sixteen  began  to  teach. 
She  was  principal  of  various  schools  in  Vermont 
and  New  York  until  1821,  at  which  time  she 
founded  the  Troy  Female  Seminary.  In  1809, 
while  in  charge  of  a school  in  Middlebury,  she  was 
married  to  Dr.  John  Willard,  United  States  Mar- 
shal for  Vermont.  She  wrote  many  popular  school 
books  and  lectured  extensively  on  questions  of 
educational  interest.  She  was  an  active  advocate 
of  the  improved  education  of  women,  and  suc- 
ceeded in  securing  grants  from  the  State  of  New 
York  for  the  furtherance  of  her  aims;  the  city  of 
Troy  also  gave  her  a building  in  which  to  found  a 
girls’  school.  She  was  the  author  of  Rocked  in  the 
Cradle  of  the  Deep,  and  much  other  verse.  Among 
her  educational  works  are  History  of  the  United 
States  (1828);  Universal  History  in  Perspective 
(1837);  Chronographer  of  English  History  (1845), 
and  Astronomography , Gr  Astronomical  Geography . 
In  1825  her  husband  died,  and  in  1838  she  was 
married  to  Dr.  Christopher  C.  Yates,  from  whom 
she  was  divorced  in  1843.  In  1846  she  made  an 
8,000-mile  tour  of  the  West  and  South,  lecturing 
to  teachers. 


EMMA  HART  WILLARD 


3°9 


Mrs.  Willard  was  the  pioneer  in  the  movement 
in  this  country  for  the  better  education  of  women. 
Her  energy,  enthusiasm,  and  strong  intellect  ex- 
erted a powerful  effect  upon  the  public.  She  lived 
to  see,  due  largely  to  her  own  efforts,  a complete 
reversal  of  the  general  ideas  regarding  the  training 
of  women. 

ROCKED  IN  THE  CRADLE  OF  THE  DEEP. 

Rocked  in  the  cradle  of  the  deep 
I lay  me  down  in  peace  to  sleep  ; 

Secure  I rest  upon  the  wave, 

For  Thou,  O Lord  ! hast  power  to  save. 

I know  Thou  wilt  not  slight  my  call, 

For  Thou  dost  mark  the  sparrow’s  fall, 

And  calm  and  peaceful  shall  I sleep, 

Rocked  in  the  cradle  of  the  deep. 

When  in  the  dead  of  night  I lie 
And  gaze  upon  the  trackless  sky, 

The  star-bespangled,  heavenly  scroll, 

The  boundless  waters  as  they  roll — 

I feel  Thy  wondrous  power  to  save 
From  perils  of  the  stormy  wave  : 

Rocked  in  the  cradle  of  the  deep, 

I calmly  rest  and  soundly  sleep. 

And  such  the  trust  that  still  were  mine, 

Though  stormy  winds  swept  o’er  the  brine, 

Or  though  the  tempest’s  fiery  breath 
Roused  me  from  sleep  to  wreck  and  death. 

In  ocean  cave  still  safe  with  Thee, 

The  germ  of  immortality  ! 

And  calm  and  peaceful  shall  I sleep, 

Rocked  in  the  cradle  of  the  deer' 


WILLARD,  Frances  Elizabeth,  an  American 
temperance  reformer,  born  at  Churchville,  near 
Rochester,  N.  Y.,  September  28,  1839;  died  in 
New  York  City,  February  17,  1898.  After  gradu- 
ation at  the  Northwestern  Female  College,  Evan- 
ston, 111.,  in  1859,  she  became  Professor  of  Natu- 
ral Science  there,  and  in  1866  principal  of  the 
Genesee  Wesleyan  Seminary.  After  travelling  in 
Europe  she  was  made  Professor  of  ^Esthetics  at 
the  Northwestern  University,  and  Dean  of  the 
Woman’s  College,  where  she  developed  a system 
of  self-government.  In  1874 she  identified  herself 
with  the  Woman’s  Christian  Temperance  Union, 
of  which  she  was  president  from  1879.  She  or- 
ganized the  Home  Protection  movement,  and 
founded  many  temperance  societies.  In  addition 
to  pamphlets  and  magazine  articles,  Miss  Willard 
was  the  author  of  Nineteen  Beautiful  Years  (1863); 
Woman  and  Temperance  (1883)  ; How  to  Win  (1886) ; 
Woman  in  the  Pulpit  (1888),  and  Glimpses  of  Fifty 
Years  (1889). 

Under  the  title  “ The  Uncrowned  Queen  of 
American  Democracy,”  W.  T.  Stead  says,  in  the 
Review  of  Reviews  : “ Even  those  who  would  deny 
her  that  proud  title  would  not  venture  to  assert 
that  it  could  be  more  properly  bestowed  upon  any 
other  living  woman.  The  worst  they  could  say 
would  be  that  America  has  no  queens,  crowned  or 
uncrowned.  ...  A Britisher,  however,  has  a 


FRANCES  ELIZABETH  WILLARD  311 

Britisher’s  privileges  as  well  as  his  prejudices,  and 
it  may  be  permitted  me  to  remark  that  ...  it 
would  certainly  be  difficult  to  find  any  more  com- 
pletely typical  and  characteristic  daughter  of 
American  democracy  than  she.  The  supreme  im- 
portance of  Miss  Willard  consists  in  the  position 
which  she  holds  to  the  two  great  movements 
which,  born  at  the  close  of  this  century,  are  des- 
tined to  mould  the  next  century,  as  the  movements 
born  in  the  French  Revolution  have  transfigured 
the  century  which  is  now  drawing  to  its  close. 
The  emancipation  of  man  and  the  triumph  of  free 
thought,  which  were  proclaimed  by  the  French 
Revolution,  were  not  more  distinctive  of  the 
eighteenth  century  than  the  emancipation  of 
woman  and  the  aspiration  after  a humanized  and 
catholic  Christianity  are  characteristic  of  our  cen- 
tury.” 


HENRY  WARD  BEECHER. 

An  seolian  harp  is  in  my  study  window  as  I write.  It 
seems  to  me  the  fittest  emblem  of  him  who  has  gone  to 
live  elsewhere  and  left  our  world  in  some  sense  lonely. 

The  compass  of  its  diapason  is  vast  as  the  scope  of 
his  mind  ; its  tenderness  deep  as  his  heart  ; its  pathos 
thrilling  as  his  sympathy  ; its  aspiration  triumphant  as 
his  faith.  Like  him,  it  is  attuned  to  every  faintest 
breath  of  the  great  world-life  ; and  like  his,  its  voice 
searches  out  the  innermost  places  of  the  human  spirit. 
Jean  Paul  says  of  the  seolian  harp,  that  it  is,  like  nature, 
“ passive  before  a divine  breath,”  and  in  him  who  has 
gone  from  us  there  was  this  elemental  receptivity  of 
God.  Other  natures  have  doubtless  developed  that 
God-consciousness  which  is  the  sum  of  all  perfections 
to  a degree  as  wonderful  as  Mr.  Beecher  did,  but  what 
other,  in  our  time,  at  least,  has  been  en  rapport  so  per- 
fectly with  those  about  him  that  they  could  share  with 


312 


FRANCES  ELIZABETH  WILLARD 


him  this  blissful  consciousness  to  a degree  as  great  ? 
John  Henry  Newman  says,  “To  God  must  be  ascribed 
the  radiation  of  genius.”  No  great  character  of  whom 
I can  think  illustrates  that  most  unique  and  felicitous 
phrase  so  clearly  as  Henry  Ward  Beecher.  He  was  the 
great,  radiating  spirit  of  our  nation  and  our  age.  For 
fifty  years  his  face  shone,  his  tones  vibrated,  his  pen 
was  electric  with  the  sense  of  a divine  presence,  not  for 
his  home  only,  not  for  his  church  or  his  nation,  but  for 
Christendom.  He  radiated  all  that  he  absorbed,  and 
his  capacious  nature  was  the  reservoir  of  all  that  is  best 
in  books,  art,  and  life.  But  as  fuel  turns  to  fire,  and  oil 
to  light,  so,  in  the  laboratory  of  his  brain,  the  raw  ma- 
terials of  history,  poetry,  and  science  were  wrought  over 
into  radiant  and  radiating  forces  which  warmed  and 
illumined  human  souls.  Plymouth  Church  was  the  most 
home-like  place  that  could  be  named  ; its  pulpit  agiow- 
ing fireside  ever  ready  to  cheer  the  despondent  and 
warm  those  hearts  the  world  had  chilled.  No  man  ever 
spoke  so  often  or  wrote  so  much  whose  classic,  historic, 
and  poetical  allusions  were  so  few  ; but  the  potency  of 
every  good  thing  ever  learned  by  him,  who  was  an  in- 
satiable student  of  nature  and  an  omnivorous  reader  of 
books,  was  all  wrought,  in  the  alembic  of  his  memory, 
into  new  forms  and  combinations.  He  intersphered  so 
perfectly  with  the  minds  and  hearts  about  him,  that  he 
seemed  to  them  a veritable  possession. 

The  interpenetrative  character  of  his  mind  has  not 
been  matched,  for  the  reason  that  he  was  that  doubly 
dowered  phenomenon — a great  brain  mated  to  a heart 
as  great.  This  royal  gift  of  sympathy  enabled  him  to 
make  all  lives  his  own  ; hence,  he  so  understood  as  to 
have  charity  for  all.  . . . For  this  reason  he  was 

born  a patriot,  a philanthropist,  and  a reformer.  We  read 
of  “ epoch-making  books,”  but  here  was  an  epoch-mak- 
ing character. — Glimpses  of  Fifty  Years. 


WILLIAMS,  Roger,  a Welsh-American  mis- 
cellaneous writer  and  founder  of  the  colony  of 
Rhode  Island,  born  in  Wales  in  1606;  died  at 
Providence,  R.  I.,  probably  in  March  or  April, 
1684.  He  entered  the  University  at  Oxford  in 
1624,  mastered  not  only  Latin,  Greek,  and  He- 
brew, but  the  French  and  Dutch  languages,  and 
took  orders  in  the  Anglican  Church;  but  having 
embraced  extreme  Puritan  views,  he  emigrated 
to  New  England  in  1631.  He  became  a minister 
at  Salem,  from  which  he  was  driven  in  1635  for 
setting  forth  “ new  and  dangerous  opinions  against 
the  authority  of  magistrates.”  Finding  it  expedi- 
ent to  leave  the  limits  of  the  Plymouth  colony, 
he  crossed  Narragansett  Bay,  and  established  a 
settlement,  to  which  he  gave  the  name  of  Provi- 
dence. In  1643  he  went  to  England  in  order  to 
procure  a charter  for  the  new  colony.  During 
the  voyage  he  wrote  a curious  Key  into  the  Lan- 
guage of  America.  While  in  England  he  wrote 
his  Bloody  Tenent  of  Persecution  for  Cause  of  Con * 
science  (1644).  To  this  the  Rev.  John  Cotton  re- 
plied in  his  Bloody  Tenent  Washed  and  Made  White 
in  the  Blood  of  the  La7nb  (1647).  Williams  rejoined 
in  his  Bloody  Tenent  yet  more  Bloody  by  Mr.  Cottons 
Endeavor  to  Wash  It  White  (1652).  Besides  the 
foregoing,  Williams  was  the  author  of  several 
other  works — among  them  a Letter  to  the  People  Of 


ROGER  WILLIAMS 


3*4 

Rhode  Island  (1655),  in  which,  as  president  of  the 
colony,  he  sets  forth  his  own  views  as  to  the 
rightful  jurisdiction  of  the  civil  magistrate  in  sev- 
eral important  respects. 

In  his  American  Literature,  Mr.  Moses  Coit 
Tyler  speaks  thus  of  the  celebrated  Letter  to  the 
People  of  Providence : “The  supreme  intellectual 
merit  of  this  composition  is  in  those  qualities  that 
never  obtrude  themselves  upon  notice — ease,  lu- 
cidity, completeness.  Here  we  have  the  final 
result  of  ages  of  intellectual  effort  presented  with- 
out effort — a long  process  of  abstract  reasoning 
made  transparent  and  irresistible  in  a picture. 
With  a wisdom  that  is  both  just  and  peaceable,  it 
fixes,  for  all  time,  the  barriers  against  tyranny  on 
the  one  side,  against  lawlessness  on  the  other.  It 
has  the  moral  and  literary  harmonies  of  a classic. 
As  such,  it  deserves  to  be  forever  memorable  in 
our  American  prose.” 

THE  PROVINCE  OF  THE  CIVIL  MAGISTRATE. 

There  goes  many  a ship  to  sea,  with  many  hundred 
souls  in  one  ship,  whose  weal  and  woe  is  common,  and 
is  a true  picture  of  a commonwealth,  or  a human  com- 
bination or  society.  It  hath  fallen  out  that  both  Pa- 
pists and  Protestants,  Jews  and  Turks,  may  be  embarked 
in  one  ship  : upon  which  supposal  I affirm  that  all  the 
liberty  of  conscience  that  I ever  pleaded  for  turns  upon 
these  two  hinges  : That  none  of  the  Papists  or  Prot- 
estants, Jews  or  Turks,  be  forced  to  come  to  the  ship’s 
jrayers  or  worship,  nor  compelled  from  their  own  par- 
ticular prayers  or  worship,  if  they  practise  any. 

I further  add,  that  I never  denied  that,  notwithstand- 
ing this  liberty,  the  commander  of  this  ship  ought  to 
command  the  ship’s  course  ; yea,  and  also  to  command 
that  justice,  peace,  and  sobriety  be  kept  and  practised, 


ROGER  WILLIAMS  3*5 

both  among  the  seamen  and  all  the  passengers.  If  any 
of  the  seamen  refuse  to  perform  their  services,  or  pas- 
sengers to  pay  their  freight;  if  any  refuse  to  help,  in 
person  or  purse,  toward  the  common  charge  or  defence ; 
if  any  refuse  to  obey  the  common  laws  and  orders  of 
the  ship  concerning  their  peace  or  preservation  ; if  any 
shall  mutiny  and  rise  up  against  their  commanders  and 
officers ; if  any  should  preach  or  write  that  there  ought 
to  be  no  commanders  or  officers,  because  all  are  equal 
in  “Christ” — therefore  no  masters  nor  officers,  no  laws, 
nor  orders,  nor  corrections,  nor  punishments ; I say  I 
never  denied  but  in  such  cases,  whatever  is  pretended, 
the  commander  or  commanders  may  judge,  resist,  com- 
pel, and  punish  such  transgressors  according  to  their 
deserts  and  merits.  This,  if  seriously  and  honestly 
minded,  may,  if  it  so  please  the  Father  of  Lights,  let  in 
some  light  to  such  as  willingly  shut  not  their  eyes.  I 
remain,  studious  of  your  common  peace  and  liberty, 
Roger  Williams. — Letter  to  the  People  of  Providence . 

Toward  the  close  of  his  life,  Roger  Williams 
was  involved  in  a controversy  with  some  leaders 
of  the  Quakers,  and  in  1676  he  put  forth  a large 
quarto  volume  embodying  his  version  of  a series 
of  stormy  debates  held  with  them.  Among  the 
notable  Quakers  were  George  Fox  and  Edward 
Burrowes,  whose  names  gave  ready  occasion  for  a 
punning  title : 

THE  FOX  AND  HIS  BURROWES. 

George  Fox  digg'd  out  of  his  Burrowes , or  an  Offer  of 
Disputation  on  fourteen  Proposalls  made  this  last  Sum- 
mer, 1672  (so  call’d),  unto  G.  Fox  then  present  on 
Rhode  Island,  in  New  England,  by  R.  W.  As  also  how 
(G.  Fox  slyly  departing)  the  Disputation  went  on,  be- 
ing managed  three  Dayes  at  Newport  on  Rhode  Island, 
and  one  Day  at  Providence,  between  John  Stubbs,  John 
Burnet,  and  William  Edmundson,  on  the  one  Part,  and 
R.  W.,  on  the  other.  In  which  many  Quotations  out  of 


3l6 


ROGER  WILLIAMS 


G.  Fox  and  Ed.  Burrowes  Book  in  Folio  are  alleged. 
With  an  Appendix,  of  some  Scores  of  G.  F.,  his  simple 
lame  answers  to  his  Opposites  in  that  Book  quoted  and 
replied  to,  by  R.  W.  of  Providence  in  N.  E. 

THE  BLOODY  TENENT  OF  PERSECUTION. 

Truth.  Dear  peace,  our  golden  sand  is  out,  we  now 
must  part  with  an  holy  kiss  of  heavenly  peace  and  love  ; 
Mr.  Cotton  speaks  and  writes  his  conscience  ; yet  the 
Father  of  Lights  may  please  to  show  him  that  what  he 
highly  esteems  as  a tenent  washed  white  in  the  Lamb’s 
blood  is  yet  more  black  and  abominable  in  the  most 
pure  and  jealous  eye  of  God. 

Peace.  The  blackamoor’s  darkness  differs  not  in  the 
dark  from  the  fairest  white. 

Truth.  Christ  Jesus,  the  Sun  of  Righteousness, 
hath  broke  forth,  and  daily  will,  to  a brighter  and 
brighter  discovery  of  this  deformed  Ethiopian.  And 
for  myself  I must  proclaim,  before  the  most  holy  God, 
angels,  and  men,  that  (whatever  other  white  and  heav- 
enly tenents  Mr.  Cotton  holds)  yet  this  is  a foul,  a black, 
and  a bloody  tenent. 

A tenent  of  high  blasphemy  against  the  God  of 
Peace,  the  God  of  Order,  Who  hath  of  one  blood  made 
all  mankind,  to  dwell  upon  the  face  of  the  earth,  now 
all  confounded  and  destroyed  in  their  civil  beings  and 
subsistences  by  mutual  flames  of  war  from  their  several 
respective  religions  and  consciences. 

A tenent  warring  against  the  Prince  of  Peace,  Christ 
Jesus,  denying  His  appearance  and  coming  in  the  flesh, 
to  put  an  end  to  and  abolish  the  shadows  of  that  cere- 
monial and  typical  land  of  Canaan. 

A tenent  fighting  against  the  sweet  end  of  His  com- 
ing, which  was  not  to  destroy  men’s  lives,  for  their  re- 
ligions, but  to  save  them  by  the  meek  and  peaceable 
invitations  and  persuasions  of  his  peaceable  wisdom’s 
maidens. 

A tenent  foully  charging  His  wisdom,  faithfulness, 
and  love,  in  so  poorly  providing  such  magistrates  and 
civil  powers  all  the  world  over  as  might  effect  so  great 
a charge  pretended  to  be  committed  to  them. 


ROGER  WILLIAMS 


377 


A tenent  lamentably  guilty  of  His  most  precious 
blood,  shed  in  the  blood  of  so  many  hundred  thousands 
of  His  poor  servants  by  the  civil  powers  of  the  world, 
pretending  to  suppress  blasphemies,  heresies,  idolatries, 
superstition,  etc. 

A tenent  fighting  with  the  spirit  of  love,  holiness, 
and  meekness,  by  kindling  fiery  spirits  of  false  zeal  and 
fury  when  yet  such  spirits  know  not  of  what  spirit  they 
are. 

A tenent  fightingwith  those  mighty  angels  who  stand 
up  for  the  peace  of  the  saints,  against  Persia,  Grecia, 
etc.,  and  so  consequently,  all  other  nations,  who,  fight- 
ing for  their  several  religions,  and  against  the  truth, 
leave  no  room  for  such  as  fear  and  love  the  Lord  on  the 
earth. 

A tenent,  against  which  the  blessed  souls  under  the 
altar  cry  loud  for  vengeance,  this  tenent  having  cut 
their  throats,  torn  out  their  hearts,  and  poured  forth 
their  blood  in  all  ages,  as  the  only  heretics  and  blas- 
phemers in  the  world. 

A tenent  loathsome  and  ugly  (in  the  eyes  of  the  God 
of  heaven,  and  serious  sons  of  men) — I say,  loathsome 
with  the  palpable  filths  of  gross  dissimulation  and  hy- 
pocrisy. Thousands  of  peoples  and  whole  nations  com- 
pelled by  this  tenent  to  put  on  the  foul  vizard  of  relig- 
ious hypocrisy,  for  fear  of  laws,  losses,  and  punishments, 
and  for  the  keeping  and  hoping  for  of  favor,  liberty, 
worldly  commodity,  etc. 

A tenent  wofully  guilty  of  hardening  all  false  and 
deluded  consciences  (of  whatsoever  sect,  faction,  heresy, 
or  idolatry,  though  never  so  horrid  and  blasphemous) 
by  cruelties  and  violences  practised  against  them  ; all 
false  teachers  and  their  followers  (ordinarily)  contract- 
ing a brawny  and  steely  hardness  from  their  sufferings 
for  their  consciences. 

A tenent  that  shuts  and  bars  out  the  gracious  prophe- 
cies and  promises  and  discoveries  of  the  most  glorious 
Son  of  Righteousness,  Christ  Jesus,  that  burns  up  the 
holy  Scriptures,  and  forbids  them  (upon  the  point)  to 
be  read  in  English,  or  that  any  trial  or  search,  or  (truly) 
free  disquisition  be  made  by  them  ; when  the  most  able, 
diligent,  and  conscionable  readers  must  pluck  forth 


GER  WILLIAMS 


318 

their  own  eyes,  and  be  forced  to  read  by  the  (whichso- 
ever predominant)  clergy’s  spectacles. 

A tenent  that  seals  up  the  spiritual  graves  of  all  men, 
Jews  and  Gentiles  (and  consequently  stands  guilty  of 
the  damnation  of  all  men),  since  no  preachers,  nor 
trumpets  of  Christ  Himself,  may  call  them  out  but  such 
as  the  several  and  respective  nations  of  the  world  them- 
selves allow  of. 

A tenent  that  fights  against  the  common  principles 
of  all  civility,  and  the  very  civil  being  and  combinations 
of  men  in  nations,  cities,  etc.,  by  commixing  (explicitly 
or  implicitly)  a spiritual  and  civil  state  together,  and  so 
confounding  and  overthrowing  the  purity  and  strength 
of  both. 

A tenent  that  stunts  the  growth  and  flourishing  of  the 
most  likely  and  hopefulest  commonweals  and  countries, 
while  consciences,  the  best,  and  the  best  deserving  sub- 
jects are  forced  to  fly  (by  enforced  or  voluntary  ban- 
ishment) from  their  native  countries  ; the  lamentable 
proof  whereof  England  hath  felt  in  the  flight  of  so  many 
worthy  English  into  the  Low  Countries  and  New-Eng- 
land,  and  from  New-England  into  old  again  and  other 
foreign  parts. 

A tenent  whose  gross  partiality  denies  the  principles  of 
common  justice,  while  men  weigh  out  to  the  consciences 
of  all  others  that  which  they  judge  not  fit  nor  right  to 
be  weighed  out  to  their  own.  Since  the  persecutor’s 
rule  is  to  take  and  persecute  all  consciences,  only  him- 
self must  not  be  touched. 

A tenent  that  is  but  Machiavelism,  and  makes  a re- 
ligion but  a cloak  or  stalking  horse  to  policy  and  pri- 
vate ends  of  Jeroboam’s  crown  and  the  priest’s  bene- 
fice, etc. 

A tenent  that  corrupts  and  spoils  the  very  civil  hon- 
esty and  natural  conscience  of  a nation.  . . . 

In  the  sad  consideration  of  all  which  (dear  Peace)  let 
heaven  and  earth  judge  of  the  washing  and  color  of  this 
tenent.  For  thee,  sweet,  heavenly  guest,  go  lodge  thee 
in  the  breasts  of  the  peaceable  and  humble  witnesses  of 
Jesus,  that  love  the  truth  in  peace.  Hide  thee  from 
the  world’s  tumults  and  combustions  in  the  breasts  of 
the.  trulv  noble  children,  who  profess  and  endeavor  to 


ROGER  WILLIAMS 


319 


break  the  irony  and  insupportable  yokes  upon  the  souls 
and  consciences  of  any  of  the  sons  of  men. 

Peace.  Methinks  (dear  Truth)  if  any  of  the  least  of 
these  deep  charges  be  found  against  this  tenent,  you 
do  not  wrong  it  when  you  style  it  bloody.  But  since, 
in  the  woful  proof  of  all  ages  past,  since  Nimrod  (the 
hunter  or  persecutor  before  the  Lord)  these  and  more 
are  lamentably  evident  and  undeniable.  It  gives  me 
wonder  that  so  many  and  so  excellent  eyes  of  God’s 
servants  should  not  espy  so  foul  a monster,  especially 
considering  the  universal  opposition  this  tenent  makes 
against  God’s  glory,  and  the  good  of  all  mankind. 

Truth.  There  hath  been  many  foul  opinions,  with 
which  the  old  serpent  hath  infected  and  bewitched  the 
sons  of  men  (touching  God,  Christ,  the  Spirit,  the 
Church,  against  holiness,  against  peace,  against  civil 
obedience,  against  chastity),  insomucn  that  even  sodomy 
itself  hath  been  a tenent  maintained  in  print  by  some 
of  the  very  pillars  of  the  Church  of  Rome.  But  this 
tenent  is  so  universally  opposite  to  God  and  man,  so 
pernicious  and  destructive  to  both  (as  hath  been  de- 
clared) that,  like  the  powder-plot,  it  threatens  to  blow  up 
all  religion,  all  civility,  all  humanity,  yea,  the  very  be- 
ing of  the  world,  and  the  nations  thereof  at  once. 

Peace.  He  that  is  the  father  of  lies,  and  a murderer 
from  the  beginning,  he  knows  this  well,  and  this  ugly 
blackamoor  needs  a mask  or  vizard. 

Truth.  Yea,  the  bloodiness  and  inhumanity  of  it  is 
such,  that  not  only  Mr.  Cotton’s  more  tender  and  holy 
breast,  but  even  the  most  bloody  Bonners  and  Gardi- 
ners have  been  forced  to  arm  themselves  with  the  fair 
shows  and  glorious  pretences  of  the  glory  of  God,  and 
zeal  for  that  glory,  the  love  of  His  truth,  the  gospel  of 
Christ  Jesus,  love  and  pity  to  men’s  souls,  the  peace  of 
the  Church,  uniformity,  order,  the  peace  of  the  com- 
monweal, the  wisdom  of  the  state,  the  King’s,  Queen’s, 
and  Parliament’s  proceedings,  the  odiousness  of  sects, 
heresies,  blasphemies,  novelties,  seducers,  and  their  in- 
fections, the  obstinacy  of  heretics,  after  all  means,  dis- 
putations, examinations,  synods,  yea,  and  after  convic- 
tion in  the  poor  heretic’s  own  conscience.  Add  to  these 
the  flattering  sound  of  those  glossing  titles,  the  godly 


320 


ROGER  WILLIAMS 


magistrate,  the  Christian  magistrate,  the  nursing  fa- 
thers and  mothers  of  the  Church,  Christian  kings  and 
queens.  But  all  other  kings  and  magistrates  (even  all 
the  nations  of  the  world  over,  as  Mr.  Cotton  pleads) 
must  suspend  and  hold  their  hands,  and  not  meddle  in 
matters  of  religion  until  they  be  informed,  etc. 

Peace.  The  dreadful,  righteous  hand  of  God,  the 
eternal  and  avenging  God,  is  pulling  off  these  masks 
and  vizards,  that  thousands  and  the  world  may  see  this 
bloody  tenent’s  beauty. 

Truth.  But  see  (my  heavenly  sister  and  true  stran- 
ger in  this  sea-like,  restless,  raging  world),  see  here 
what  fires  and  swords  are  come  to  part  us.  Weil  ; our 
meetings  in  the  heavens  shall  not  thus  be  interrupted, 
our  kisses  thus  distracted,  and  our  eyes  and  cheeks 
thus  wet,  unwiped.  For  me,  though  censured,  threat- 
ened, persecuted,  I must  profess,  while  heaven  and 
earth  lasts  that  no  one  tenent  that  either  London,  Eng- 
land, or  the  world  doth  harbor,  is  so  heretical,  blasphe- 
mous, seditious,  and  dangerous  to  the  corporal,  to  the 
spiritual,  to  the  present,  to  the  eternal  good  of  all  men, 
as  the  bloody  tenent  (however  washed  and  whited)  I 
say,  as  is  the  bloody  tenent  of  persecution  for  cause  of 
conscience. — The  Bloody  Tenent  Yet  More  Bloody . 


WILLIAMS,  Samuel  Wells,  an  American  lin- 
guist and  traveller,  born  at  Utica,  N.  Y.,  Septem- 
ber 22,  1 3 1 2 ; died  at  New  Haven,  Conn.,  Feb- 
ruary 1 7,  1884.  He  studied  at  the  Polytechnic 
vSchool  in  Albany,  and  in  1833  went  to  Canton, 
China,  to  superintend  the  printing  operations  of 
the  American  Board  of  Commissioners  for  For- 
eign Missions.  He  was  made  assistant  editor  of 
the  Chinese  Repository , which  had  just  been  estab- 
lished, and  which  was  continued  for  twenty  years, 
finally  under  his  editorial  charge.  In  1837  he  paid 
a visit  to  Japan,  in  order  to  take  home  a number 
of  shipwrecked  sailors ; and  mastered  the  language 
so  as  to  translate  into  it  the  Book  of  Genesis  and 
the  Gospel  of  Matthew.  In  1845  he  returned  to 
America  to  procure  a font  of  Chinese  type,  which 
was  ordered  from  Germany.  He  delivered  a 
course  of  lectures  on  China,  which  were  in  1848 
enlarged  and  published  under  the  title  of  The  Mid- 
dle Kingdom.  He  returned  to  China  in  1848,  hav- 
ing received  from  Union  College  the  honorary 
degree  of  LL.D.  In  1853-54  he  accompanied,  as 
interpreter,  Commodore  Perry’s  expedition  to 
Japan.  In  1855  he  was  made  United  States  Sec- 
retary of  Legation  in  Japan,  being  at  the  head  of 
the  embassy  there  until  the  arrival  of  the  Minister. 
He  was  afterward  employed  as  linguist  to  the 
United  States  Government  in  China  until  1875, 


322 


SAMUEL  WELLS  WILLIAMS 


when  he  returned  to  America,  after  an  absence  of 
more  than  forty  years  in  China  and  Japan. 

His  principal  works  are  Easy  Lessons  in  Chinese 
(1842);  Chinese  Commercial  Guide  (1844);  English 
and  Chinese  Vocabulary  in  the  Court  Dialect  (1844) ; 
The  Middle  Kingdom  (1848) ; Syllable  Dictionary  of 
the  Chinese  Language  (1874).  After  his  final  return 
to  the  United  States,  he  undertook  a revision  of 
The  Middle  Kingdom , of  which  a much  enlarged 
edition  was  published  in  1883. 

THE  GREAT  WALL  OF  CHINA. 

The  entire  length  of  the  Great  Wall,  between  its  ex- 
tremities, is  22^/2  degrees  of  longitude,  or  1,255  miles 
in  a straight  line  ; but  its  turnings  and  doublings  in- 
crease it  to  fully  1,500  miles.  It  would  stretch  from 
Philadelphia  to  Topeka,  or  from  Portugal  to  Naples, 
on  nearly  the  same  latitude.  The  construction  of  this 
gigantic  work  is  somewhat  adapted  to  the  nature  of  the 
country  it  traverses,  and  the  material  was  taken  on  the 
spot  where  it  was  used.  In  the  western  part  of  its 
course  it  is  merely  a mud-and-gravel  wall,  and  in  other 
cases  earth  cased  with  brick. 

The  eastern  part  is  generally  composed  of  earth  and 
pebbles  faced  with  large  bricks,  weighing  from  40  to 
50  pounds  each,  supported  on  a coping  of  stone.  The 
whole  is  about  25  feet  thick  at  the  base,  and  15  feet 
wide  at  the  top,  and  varying  from  15  to  30  feet  high. 
The  top  is  protected  with  bricks,  and  defended  with 
a straight  parapet,  the  thickness  of  which  has  been 
taken  as  a proof  that  cannon  were  unknown  at  the 
time  it  was  erected.  There  are  brick  towers  at  inter- 
vals, some  of  them  more  than  40  feet  high,  but  not 
built  upon  the  wall.  These  are  independent  structures, 
usually  about  40  feet  square  at  the  base,  diminishing 
to  30  feet  at  the  top  ; at  particular  spots  the  towers 
are  of  two  stories. 

The  impression  left  upon  the  mind  of  a foreigner,  on 


THE  GREAT  WALL  OF  CHINA. 


rot  iwiif 

OF  IKE 

MMawmr  o?  awwis 


SAMUEL  WELLS  WILLIAMS 


323 


seeing  this  monument  of  toil  and  unremunerative  out- 
lay, is  respect  for  a people  that  could  in  any  manner 
build  it.  Standing  on  the  peak  at  Ku-peh-kan  (Old 
North  Gate),  one  sees  the  cloud-capped  towers  extend- 
ing away  over  the  declivities  in  single  files,  both  east 
and  west,  until  dwarfed  by  miles  and  miles  of  skyward 
perspective,  as  they  divide  into  minute  piles,  yet  stand 
with  solemn  stillness  where  they  were  stationed  twenty 
centuries  ago,  as  though  condemned  to  wait  the  march 
of  time  till  their  builders  returned.  The  crumbling 
dyke  at  their  feet  may  be  followed,  winding,  leaping 
across  gorges,  defiles,  and  steeps  ; now  buried  in  some 
chasm,  now  scaling  the  cliffs  and  slopes,  in  very  ex- 
uberance of  power  and  wantonness,  as  it  vanishes  in  a 
thin,  shadowy  line  at  the  horizon.  Once  seen,  the  Great 
Wall  of  China  can  never  be  forgotten. 

At  present,  this  remarkable  structure  is  simply  a geo- 
graphical boundary,  and  except  at  the  gates  nothing  is 
done  to  keep  it  in  repair.  Beyond  the  Yellow  River  to 
its  western  extremity,  the  Great  Wall,  according  to  Gre- 
billon,  is  mostly  a mound  of  earth  or  gravel,  about  15 
feet  in  height,  with  only  occasional  towers  of  brick  or 
gateways  made  of  stone.  At  Kalgan,  portions  of  it  are 
made  of  porphyry  and  other  stones  piled  up  in  pyram- 
idal form  between  the  brick  towers — difficult  to  cross, 
but  easy  enough  to  pull  down. 

The  appearance  of  this  rampart  at  Ku-peh-kan  is  more 
imposing.  The  entire  extent  of  the  main  and  cross 
walls  in  sight  from  one  of  the  towers  there  is  over 
twenty  miles.  In  one  place  it  rises  over  a peak  5,225 
feet  high,  where  it  is  so  steep  as  to  make  one  wonder  as 
much  at  the  labor  of  erecting  it  on  such  a cliff,  as  on 
the  folly  of  supposing  it  could  be  of  any  use  there  as  a 
defence.  The  Wall  is  most  visited  at  Nan-kan  (South 
Gate),  in  the  Ku-Yang  Pass — a remarkable  Thermop- 
ylae, fifteen  miles  in  length,  which  leads  from  the  plain 
at  Peking  up  to  the  first  terrace  above  it,  and  at  one 
time  was  guarded  by  five  additional  walls  and  gates. 
From  this  spot  the  Wall  reaches  across  Shan-si,  and  was 
built  at  a later  period. — The  Middle  Kingdom . 


Vo u XXIV.— ai 


WILLIS,  Nathaniel  Parker,  an  American 
poet  and  miscellaneous  writer,  born  at  Portland, 
Me.,  January  20,  1806;  died  at  Idlewild-on-the- 
Hudson,  January  20,  1867.  While  a student  at 
Yale  College,  where  he  was  graduated  in  1827, 
he  wrote  several  poems,  mainly  of  a religious 
character,  which  gained  for  him  no  little  reputa- 
tion. For  several  years  after  leaving  college  he 
was  engaged  in  literary  work,  finally  forming  a 
connection  with  the  New  York  Mirror , to  which 
he  contributed  a series  of  letters  under  the  title  of 
Pencillings  by  the  Way,  describing  his  observations 
in  Europe,  whither  he  went  in  1833.  Returning 
to  the  United  States  he  took  up  his  residence  at  a 
pretty  little  estate  which  he  purchased  in  the  val- 
ley of  the  Susquehanna,  and  named  “ Glenmary,” 
for  his  wife,  whom  he  had  married  in  England. 
Here  he  wrote  his  Letters  from  Under  a Bridge , 
which  contains  his  best  prose.  After  five  years  he 
was  compelled  to  offer  Glenmary  for  sale.  He 
then,  in  conjunction  with  Dr.  Porter,  established 
the  Corsair , a weekly  journal  of  literature.  Dur- 
ing a second  stay  in  England  he  published  Loiter- 
ings of  Travel,  produced  two  plays,  Bianca  Visconti 
and  Tortesa  the  Usurer,  and  wrote  the  descriptive 
matter  for  an  illustrated  work,  The  Scenery  of 
the  United  States . The  publication  of  the  Corsair 


NATHANIEL  PARSER  WILLIS 


325 


was  abandoned,  and  Willis  aided  George  P.  Mor- 
ris in  establishing  the  Evening  Mirror , a daily 
newspaper.  His  health  broke  down,  and  he  again 
went  abroad,  having  been  made  an  attach / of  the 
American  Legation  at  Berlin.  He  now  proposed 
to  make  Germany  his  permanent  residence ; but 
finding  the  climate  unfavorable  to  him,  he  re- 
turned to  New  York.  The  daily  Evening  Mirror 
was  given  up,  and  the  weekly  Home  Journal  took 
its  place.  He  took  up  his  residence  at  Idlewild- 
on-the-Hudson,  near  Newburgh,  where  he  died  on 
his  sixty-first  birthday. 

The  prose  writings  of  Willis  consist  mainly  of 
letters  and  other  articles  furnished  to  periodicals. 
They  include  Pencillings  by  the  Way,  Letters  from 
Under  a Bridge , Rural  Letters , People  I Have  Met 9 
Life  Here  and  There , Hurry-graphs , A Summer 
Cruise  in  the  Mediterranean , Fun-jottings , A Health 
Trip  to  the  Tropics , Out-doors  at  I die  wild , Famous 
Persons  and  Places , The  Rag  Bag,  Paul  Fane,  a 
novel ; The  Convalescent — the  last  being  written 
in  1859.  His  Poems,  most  of  them  being  short 
pieces,  of  varying  character,  have  been  published 
collectively. 

THE  MISERERE. 

The  procession  crept  slowly  up  to  the  church,  and  I 
left  them  kneeling  at  the  tomb  of  St.  Peter,  and  went 
to  the  side  chapel,  to  listen  to  the  miserere.  The  choir 
here  is  said  to  be  inferior  to  that  in  the  Sistine  chapel, 
but  the  circumstances  more  than  make  up  for  the  differ- 
ence, which,  after  all,  it  takes  a nice  ear  to  detect.  I 
could  not  but  congratulate  myself,  as  I sat  down  on  the 
base  of  a pillar,  in  the  vast  aisle,  without  the  chapel 
where  the  choir  were  chanting,  with  the  twilight  gather- 


326  NATHANIEL  PARKER  WILLIS 

ing  in  the  lofty  arches,  and  the  candles  of  the  various 
processions  creeping  to  the  consecrated  sepulchre  from 
the  distant  parts  of  the  church. 

It  was  so  different  in  that  crowded  and  suffocating 
chapel  of  the  Vatican,  where,  fine  as  was  the  music,  I 
vowed  positively  never  to  subject  myself  to  such  annoy- 
ance again. 

It  had  become  almost  dark,  when  the  last  candle  but 
one  was  extinguished  in  the  symbolical  pyramid,  and 
the  first  almost  painful  note  of  the  miserere  wailed  out 
into  the  vast  church  of  St.  Peter.  For  the  next  half 
hour,  the  kneeling  listeners  around  the  door  of  the 
chapel  seemed  spellbound  in  their  motionless  attitudes. 

The  darkness  thickened,  the  hundred  lamps  at  the 
far-off  sepulchre  of  the  saint  looked  like  a galaxy  of 
twinkling  points  of  fire,  almost  lost  in  the  distance,  and 
from  the  now  perfectly  obscured  choir  poured,  in  ever- 
varying  volume,  the  dirge-like  music,  in  notes  inconceiv- 
ably plaintive  and  affecting. 

The  power,  the  mingled  mournfulness  and  sweetness, 
the  impassioned  fulness,  at  one  moment,  and  the  lost, 
shrieking  wildness  of  one  solitary  voice  at  another,  carry 
away  the  soul  like  a whirlwind.  I never  have  been  so 
moved  by  anything.  It  is  not  in  the  scope  of  lan- 
guage to  convey  an  idea  to  another  of  the  effect  of  the 
miserere. 

It  was  not  till  several  minutes  after  the  music  had 
ceased,  that  the  dark  figures  rose  up  from  the  floor 
about  me. 

As  we  approached  the  door  of  the  church,  the  full 
moon,  about  three  hours  risen,  poured  broadly  under 
the  arches  of  the  portico,  inundating  the  whole  front  of 
the  lofty  dome  with  a flood  of  light  such  as  falls  only 
in  Italy. 

There  seemed  to  be  no  atmosphere  between.  Day- 
light is  scarce  more  intense.  The  immense  square, 
with  its  slender  obelisk  and  embracing  crescents  of  col- 
onnade, lay  spread  out  as  definitely  to  the  eye  as  at 
noon,  and  the  two  famous  fountains  shot  up  their  clear 
waters  to  the  sky,  the  moonlight  streaming  through  the 
spray,  and  every  drop  as  visible  and  bright  as  a dia- 
mond.— Pencil  lings  by  the  Way. 


NATHANIEL  PARKER  WILLIS 


327 


TWO  WOMEN. 

The  shadows  lay  along  Broadway, 

’Twas  near  the  twilight-tide, 

And  slowly  there  a lady  fair 
Was  walking  in  her  pride. 

Alone  walked  she  ; but,  viewlessly. 

Walked  spirits  at  her  side. 

Peace  charmed  the  street  beneath  her  feet. 
And  Honor  charmed  the  air  ; 

And  all  astir  looked  kind  on  her, 

And  called  her  good  as  fair— 

For  all  God  ever  gave  to  her 
She  kept  with  chary  care. 

She  kept  with  care  her  beauties  rare 
From  lovers  warm  and  true, 

For  her  heart  was  cold  to  all  but  gold, 

And  the  rich  came  not  to  woo — 

But  honored  well  are  charms  to  sell 
If  priests  the  selling  do. 

Now  walking  there  was  one  more  fair— 

A slight  girl,  lily-pale  ; 

And  she  had  unseen  company 
To  make  the  spirit  quail. 

’Twixt  Want  and  Scorn  she  walked  forlorn, 
And  nothing  could  avail. 

No  mercy  now  can  clear  her  brow 
For  this  world’s  peace  to  pray  ; 

For  as  love’s  wild  prayer  dissolved  in  air 
Her  woman’s  heart  gave  way  ! — 

But  the  sin  forgiven  by  Christ  in  heaven, 

By  man  is  cursed  alway  ! 

TO  A CITY  PIGEON. 

Stoop  to  my  window,  beautiful  dove ! 

Thy  daily  visits  have  touched  my  love : 


328  NATHANIEL  PARKER  WILLIS 

I watch  thy  coming  and  list  the  note 
That  stirs  so  low  in  thy  mellow  throat ; 

And  my  joy  is  high 

To  catch  the  glance  of  thy  gentle  eye. 

Why  dost  thou  sit  on  the  heated  eaves, 

And  forsake  the  wood  with  its  freshened  leaves? 
Why  dost  thou  haunt  the  sultry  street, 

When  the  paths  of  the  forest  are  cool  and  sweet  ? 
How  canst  thou  bear 
This  noise  of  people,  this  sultry  air  ? 

Thou  alone  of  the  feathered  race 
Dost  look  unscared  on  the  human  face  ; 

Thou  alone,  with  a wing  to  flee, 

Dost  love  with  man  in  his  haunts  to  be  ; 

And  the  “ gentle  Dove  ” 

Has  become  a name  of  Truth  and  Love. 

A holy  gift  is  thine,  sweet  bird ! 

Thou’rt  named  with  childhood’s  earliest  word; 
Thou’rt  linked  with  all  that  is  fresh  and  wild 
In  the  prisoned  thoughts  of  the  city  child ; 

And  thy  glossy  wings 

Are  its  brightest  image  of  moving  things. 

It  is  no  light  chance  : thou  art  set  apart 
Wisely  by  Him  who  has  tamed  thy  heart, 

To  stir  the  love  for  the  bright  and  fair, 

That  else  were  sealed  in  this  crowded  air ; 

And  I sometimes  dream 

Angelic  rays  from  thy  pinions  stream. 

Come  then,  ever,  when  the  daylight  leaves 
The  page  I read,  to  my  humble  eaves, 

And  wash  thy  breast  in  the  hollow  spout, 

And  murmur  thy  low,  sweet  music  out. 

I hear  and  see 

Lessons  of  heaven,  sweet  bird,  in  thee. 

THIRTY-FIVE. 

“The  years  of  a man’s  life  are  threescore  and  ten.” 
O weary  heart ! thou’rt  half-way  home  ! 


NATHANIEL  PARKER  WILLIS 


329 


We  stand  on  life’s  meridian  height — 

As  far  from  childhood’s  morning  come, 

As  to  the  grave’s  forgetful  night. 

Give  Youth  and  Hope  a parting  tear  ; 

Look  onward  with  a placid  brow  : 

Hope  promised  but  to  bring  us  here, 

And  reason  takes  the  guidance  now. 

One  backward  look — the  last — the  last ! 

One  silent  tear — for  Youth  is  past ! 

Who  goes  with  Hope  and  Passion  back  ? 

Who  comes  with  me  and  Memory  on  ? 

Oh  ! lonely  looks  the  downward  track — 

Joy’s  music  hushed — Hope’s  roses  gone  ! 

To  Pleasure  and  her  giddy  troop 
Farewell,  without  a sigh  or  tear! 

But  hearts  give  way,  and  spirits  droop, 

To  think  that  Love  may  leave  us  here. 

Have  we  no  charm  when  Youth  has  flown — 

Midway  to  death  left  sad  and  lone  ? 

Yet  stay  ! As  ’twere  a twilight  star 
That  sends  its  thread  across  the  wave, 

I see  a brightening  light,  from  far, 

Steal  down  a path  beyond  the  grave. 

And  now — bless  God  ! — its  golden  line 
Comes  o’er,  and  lights  my  shadowy  way 
And  shows  the  dear  hand  clasped  in  mine. 

But  list,  what  those  sweet  voices  say : 

“The  Better  Land’s  in  sight, 

And,  by  its  chastening  light, 

All  love  from  life’s  midway  is  driven, 

Save  her  whose  clasped  hand  will  bring  thee  on  tc 
Heaven.” 


WILLSON,  Byron  Forceythe,  an  American 
poet,  born  at  Little  Genesee,  N.  Y.,  April  io,  1837  ; 
died  at  Alfred,  N.  Y.,  February  2,  1867.  He  was 
educated  at  Harvard,  but  impaired  health  pre- 
vented his  graduation.  He  became  an  editorial 
writer  for  the  Louisville  Journal , in  which  many 
of  his  poems  were  published.  The  best  known  of 
his  writings  is  The  Old  Sergeant,  a carrier’s  ad- 
dress, printed  in  that  paper,  January  1, 1863,  which 
is  a true  story.  He  published  a volume  of  Poems 
in  1866. 

“ I believe  many  readers  will  agree  with  me  in 
thinking  that  such  poetry  ...  is  the  prod- 
uct of  an  unusually  rare  spirit,”  says  J.  J.  Piatt 

in  the  Atlantic  Monthly . 

“ In  the  Rhyme  of  the  Master  s Mate  and  In  State, 
the  simplest  and  most  direct  language,  here  and 
there,  is  thrilled  with  nerves  of  uncommon  pas- 
sion and  force  ; in  other  poems  there  is  gossamer- 
like, elusive  grace  ; elsewhere,  throughout  Will- 
son’s poems,  we  find  beauty,  tenderness,  and 
pathos,  with  pure  and  lofty  habits  of  thought 
always  observable.” 

THE  OLD  SERGEANT. 

u Come  a little  nearer,  Doctor  ; thank  you, — let  me  take 
the  cup  : 

Draw  your  chair  up — draw  it  closer — just  another  little 
sup ! 


BYRON"  FORCE  YTIIE  WILLSON 


331 

Maybe  you  may  think  I’m  better  ; but  I’m  pretty  well 
used  up — 

Doctor,  you’ve  done  all  you  could  do,  but  I'm  just  a 
going  up.  . . . 

“ Doctor  Austin  ! — what  day  is  this  ? ” “It  is  Wednes- 
day night,  you  know.” 

“Yes,  to-morrow  will  be  New  Year’s,  and  a right  good 
time  below  ! 

What  time  is  it,  Doctor  Austin?”  “ Nearly  twelve.” 
“ Then  don’t  you  go  ! 

Can  it  be  that  all  this  happened — all  this — not  an  hour 
ago! 

“ That  was  where  the  gun-boats  opened  on  the  dark, 
rebellious  host ; 

And  where  Webster  semicircled  his  last  guns  upon  the 
coast ; 

There  were  still  the  two  log-houses,  just  the  same,  or 
else  their  ghost — 

And  the  same  old  transport  came  and  took  me  over — 
or  its  ghost  ! 

“And  the  old  field  lay  before  me  all  deserted  far  and 
wide  ; 

There  was  where  they  fell  on  Prentiss — there  McCler- 
nand  met  the  tide  ; 

There  was  where  old  Sherman  rallied,  and  where  Hurl- 
but’s  horses  died — 

Lower  down,  where  Wallace  charged  them,  and  kept 
charging  till  he  died. 

“There  was  where  Lew  Wallace  showed  them  he  was  of 
the  canny  kin, 

There  was  where  old  Nelson  thundered,  and  where 
Rousseau  waded  in, 

There  McCook  sent  ’em  to  breakfast,  and  we  all  began 
to  win — 

There  was  where  the  grape-shot  took  me,  just  as  we 
began  to  win. 


332 


BYRON  FORCEYTHE  WILLSON 


" Now,  a shroud  of  snow  and  silence  over  everything 
was  spread ; 

And  but  for  this  old  blue  mantle  and  the  old  hat  on  my 
head 

I should  not  have  even  doubted,  to  this  moment,  I was 
dead — 

For  my  footsteps  were  as  silent  as  the  snow  upon  the 
dead  ! 

“ Death  and  silence  ! — Death  and  silence  ! all  around 
me  as  I sped  ! 

And  behold,  a mighty  Tower,  as  if  builded  to  the  dead — 

To  the  Heaven  of  the  heavens,  lifted  up  its  mighty  head, 

Till  the  stars  and  stripes  of  Heaven  all  seemed  waving 
from  its  head ! 

“ Round  and  mighty-based  it  towered — up  into  the  in- 
finite— 

And  I knew  no  mortal  mason  could  have  built  a shaft 
so  bright ; 

For  it  shone  like  solid  sunshine  ; and  a winding  stair  of 
light 

Wound  around  it  and  around  it  till  it  wound  clear  out 
of  sight ! 

“And,  behold,  as  I approached  it — with  a rapt  and 
dazzled  stare — 

Thinking  that  I saw  old  comrades  just  ascending  the 
great  Stair — 

Suddenly  the  solemn  challenge  broke  of — ‘ Halt,  and 
who  goes  there  ! ’ 

‘I’m  a friend,’  I said,  ‘if  you  are.’  ‘Then  advance,  sir, 
to  the  Stair.’ 

“ I advanced  ! — That  sentry,  Doctor,  was  Elijah  Ballan- 
tyne  ! — 

First  of  all  to  fall  on  Monday,  after  we  had  formed  the 
line  ! — 

‘Welcome,  my  old  Sergeant,  welcome!  Welcome  by 
that  countersign  ! ’ 

And  he  pointed  to  the  scar  there,  under  this  old  cloak 
of  mine  ! 


BYRON  FORCEYTHE  WILLSON 


333 


“ As  he  grasped  my  hand,  I shuddered,  thinking  only  of 
the  grave  ; 

But  he  smiled  and  pointed  upward  with  a bright  and 
bloodless  glaive  : 

‘ That’s  the  way,  sir,  to  Head-quarters.’  ‘ What  Head- 
quarters ?’ — ‘ Of  the  Brave.’ 

‘But  the  great  Tower?’ — ‘That,’  he  answered,  ‘is  the 
way,  sir,  of  the  Brave  ! ’ 

“ Then  a sudden  shame  came  o’er  me  at  his  uniform  of 
light ; 

At  my  own  so  old  and  tattered,  and  at  his  so  new  and 
bright ; 

‘ Ah  ! ’ said  he,  ‘you  have  forgotten  the  New  Uniform 
to-night — 

Hurry  back,  for  you  must  be  here  at  just  twelve  o’clock 
to-night ! ’ 

“ And  the  next  thing  I remember,  you  were  sitting 
there,  and  I — 

Doctor — did  you  hear  a footstep  ? Hark  ! — God  bless 
you  all  ! Good-by  ! 

Doctor,  please  to  give  my  musket  and  my  knapsack, 
when  I die, 

To  my  son — my  son  that’s  coming — he  won’t  get  here 
till  I die ! 

“Tell  him  his  old  father  blessed  him  as  he  never  did 
before — 

And  to  carry  that  old  musket — ” Hark  ! a knock  is  at 
the  door — 

“ Till  the  Union — ” See,  it  opens! — “Father!  Father! 
speak  once  more  ! ” — 

“j Bless  you!”  gasped  the  old,  gray  sergeant,  and  he  lay 
and  said  no  more. 

— The  Old  Sergeant , and  Other  Poems. 


WILSON,  Alexander,  a Scottish- American 
ornithologist  and  poet,  born  at  Paisley,  Scotland, 
July  6,  1766;  died  in  Philadelphia,  August  23, 
1813.  He  was  a weaver  by  trade,  cultivated  po- 
etry, came  to  America  in  1794,  and  taught  school 
in  several  places  in  Pennsylvania.  By  association 
with  William  Bartram  he  became  interested  in 
ornithology,  and  travelled  much  to  collect  birds. 
He  was  a competent  pioneer  in  this  work,  and 
from  1808  he  put  forth  his  volumes  of  America7i 
Ornithology , himself  drawing  the  faithful  pictures. 
In  1814  the  work  was  completed  in  nine  volumes. 
It  was  issued  in  two  volumes,  after  his  death,  and, 
with  a continuation  by  C.  L.  Bonaparte,  in  four 
volumes  in  1833.  He  published  volumes  of  Poems 
at  Paisley  (1790  and  1791),  and,  in  1792,  a poem, 
Watty  and  Meg , which  was  ascribed  to  Burns. 
His  excursion  to  Western  New  York  he  described 
in  a poem,  The  Foresters. 

“The  poems  of  Wilson,”  says  Duyckinck,  “ re- 
flect his  sympathies,  his  sensibilities,  his  love  of 
humorous  observation  among  men,  as  his  prose, 
with  its  quick,  lively  step  and  minute  description, 
so  freshly  pictures  the  animal  world.  In  his  hu- 
mor and  feeling,  Wilson,  as  a poet,  belongs  to  the 
family  of  Burns.” 

THE  BLUEBIRD. 

Such  are  the  mild  and  pleasing  manners  of  the  blue- 
bird, and  so  universally  is  he  esteemed*  that  I have 

(334) 


ALEXANDER  WILSON 


335 


often  regretted  that  no  pastoral  muse  has  yet  arisen  in 
this  western  woody  world  to  do  justice  to  his  name, 
and  endear  him  to  us  still  more  by  the  tenderness  of 
verse,  as  has  been  done  to  his  representative  in  Britain, 
the  robin  redbreast.  A small  acknowledgment  of  this 
kind  I have  to  offer,  which  the  reader,  I hope,  will  ex- 
cuse as  a tribute  to  rural  innocence. 

When  winter’s  cold  tempests  and  snows  are  no  more, 
Green  meadows  and  brown-furrowed  fields  reappearing, 

The  fishermen  hauling  their  shad  to  the  shore, 

And  cloud-cleaving  geese  to  the  lakes  are  a-steering  ; 

When  first  the  lone  butterfly  flits  on  the  wing, 

When  red  glow  the  maples,  so  fresh  and  so  pleasing, 

Oh,  then  comes  the  bluebird,  the  herald  of  spring  ! 
And  hails  with  his  warblings  the  charms  of  the  season. 

Then  loud-piping  frogs  make  the  marshes  to  ring  ; 
Then  warm  glows  the  sunshine,  and  fine  is  the  weather  ; 

The  blue  woodland  flowers  just  beginning  to  spring, 
And  spicewood  and  sassafras  budding  together  : 

Oh,  then  to  your  gardens  ye  housewives  repair, 

Your  walks  border  up,  sow  and  plant  at  your  leisure  ; 

The  bluebird  will  chant  from  his  box  such  an  air, 
That  all  your  hard  toils  will  seem  truly  a pleasure. 

He  flits  through  the  orchard,  he  visits  each  tree, 

The  red-flowering  peach,  and  the  apple’s  sweet  blos- 
soms ; 

He  snaps  up  destroyers  wherever  they  be, 

And  seizes  the  caitiffs  that  lurk  in  their  blossoms  : 

He  drags  the  vile  grub  from  the  corn  it  devours, 

The  worms  from  their  webs,  where  they  riot  and  welter ; 

His  songs  and  his  services  freely  are  ours, 

And  all  that  he  asks  is — in  summer  a shelter. 

The  ploughman  is  pleased  when  he  gleams  in  his  train, 
Now  searching  the  furrows — now  mounting  to  cheer 
him  ; 

The  gardener  delights  in  his  sweet,  simple  strain, 
And  leans  on  his  spade  to  survey  and  to  hear  him ; 


336 


A LEX  A NDER  WILSON 


The  slow-ling’ring  school-boys  forget  they’ll  be  chid, 
While  gazing  intent  as  he  warbles  before  them 
In  mantle  of  sky-blue,  and  bosom  so  red, 

That  each  little  loiterer  seems  to  adore  him. 

When  all  the  gay  scenes  of  summer  are  o’er, 

And  autumn  slow  enters  so  silent  and  sallow, 

And  millions  of  warblers,  that  charmed  us  before, 
Have  fled  in  the  train  of  the  sun-seeking  swallow ; 

The  bluebird,  forsaken,  yet  true  to  his  home, 

Still  lingers,  and  looks  for  a milder  to-morrow, 

Till,  forced  by  the  horrors  of  winter  to  roam, 

He  sings  his  adieu  in  a lone  note  of  sorrow. 

While  spring’s  lovely  season,  serene,  dewy,  warm, 
The  green  face  of  earth,  and  the  pure  blue  of  heaven, 
Or  love’s  native  music  have  influence  to  charm, 

Or  sympathy’s  glow  to  our  feelings  is  given, 

Still  dear  to  each  bosom  the  bluebird  shall  be  ; 

His  voice,  like  the  thrillings  of  hope,  is  a treasure  ; 

For,  through  the  bleakest  storms,  if  a calm  he  but 
see, 

He  comes  to  remind  us  of  sunshine  and  pleasure ! 


WILSON,  Augusta  J.  Evans,  an  American 
novelist,  born  at  Columbus,  Ga.,  May  8,  1838. 
Her  earlier  novels  were  published  under  her  maid- 
en name  of  Evans.  In  1868  she  was  married  to 
L.  M.  Wilson,  of  Mobile,  Ala.,  where  she  has  since 
resided.  Her  novels  include  Inez  (1856);  Beulah 
(1859);  Macaria  (1864);  St.  Elmo  (1866);  Vashti 
(1869)  ; Infelice{  1875),  and  At  the  Mercy  of  Tiberius 
(1889). 

Mrs.  Wilson’s  books  have  been  very  popular 
with  romantic  young  women  in  and  out  of  board- 
ing-schools for  many  a day.  Her  heroines  are 
often  marvels  of  learning,  yet  full  of  romance  and 
ready  to  succumb  to  the  fascinations  of  heroes 
generally  superbly  handsome,  daring,  and  accom- 
plished, who  are  weighted  down  with  “ pasts”  full 
of  romantic  mystery  and  unhappiness.  But  Mrs. 
Wilson  does  not  write  trash,  withal ; her  style,  if 
a little  strained  and,  again,  heavy,  is,  on  the  whole, 
good  ; her  depiction  of  Southern  plantation  life  in 
ante-bellum  days  is  vividly  correct,  and  her  gen- 
tlemen and  gentlewoman  are  such  in  the  true 
sense  of  the  words.  The  excerpt  printed  below  il- 
lustrates the  surroundings  in  which  she  loves  to 
place  her  heroes,  and  explains  the  good-natured 
banter  from  reviewers  who  fully  appreciate  the 
sterling  value  of  her  work. 

Mrs,  Wilson’s  novels,  according  to  Professor  J. 
(337} 


33$ 


AVGUSTA  J.  EVANS  HUTSON 


S.  Hart,  “ are  characterized  by  great  power  of 
originality.  Macaria  and  St.  Elmo  are  admitted 
by  all  to  show  remarkable  power.” 

“ Everybody  read  Beulah ,”  says  Professor  J. 
Wood  Davidson.  “ It  ran  through  ten  or  fifteen 
editions,  possibly  more,  in  a few  months.  Its 
fresh,  vigorous  style  stimulated  a lively  interest.” 

THE  LIBRARY  AND  THE  i(  HERO.” 

When  the  echo  of  her  retreating  steps  died  away,  St. 
Elmo  threw  his  cigar  out  of  the  window,  and  walked  up 
and  down  the  quaint  and  elegant  rooms,  whose  costly 
bizarrerie  would  more  appropriately  have  adorned  a vil- 
la of  Parthenope  or  Lucanian  Sybaris  than  a country- 
house  in  soi-disant  “ Republican  ” America.  The  floor, 
covered  in  winter  with  velvet  carpet,  was  of  white  and 
black  marble,  now  bare  and  polished  as  a mirror,  re- 
flecting the  figure  of  the  owner  as  he  crossed  it.  Oval 
ormolu  tables,  buhl  chairs,  and  oaken  and  marqueterie 
cabinets,  loaded  with  cameos,  intaglios,  Abraxoids, 
whose  “ erudition  ” would  have  filled  Mnesarchus  with 
envy,  and  challenged  the  admiration  of  the  Samian  lapi- 
dary who  engraved  the  ring  of  Polycrates — these  and 
numberless  articles  of  virtu  testified  to  the  universality  of 
what  St.  Elmo  called  his  “ world  scrapings  ” and  to  the 
reckless  extravagance  and  archaistic  taste  of  the  col- 
lector. . . . On  a verd-antique  table  stood  an  ex- 

quisite white  glass  lamp,  shaped  like  a vase  and  richly 
ornamented  with  Arabic  inscriptions  in  ultramarine- 
blue — a precious  relic  of  some  ruined  Laura  in  the  Nit- 
rian  desert,  by  the  aid  of  whose  rays  the  hoary  hermits 
whom  St.  Macarius  ruled  had  broken  the  midnight  gloom, 
chanting  “ Kyrie  eleison,  Christe  eleison ,”  fourteen  hun- 
dred years  before  St.  Elmo’s  birth.  Several  handsome 
rosewood  cases  were  filled  with  rare  books — two  in  Pali 
— centuries  old  ; and  moth-eaten  and  valuable  manu- 
script— some  in  parchment,  some  in  boards — recalled 
the  days  of  astrology  and  alchemy  and  the  sombre  mys- 
teries of  Rosicrucianism.  . . . But  expensive  an<£ 


AUGUSTA  J.  EVANS  WILSON 


339 


rare  as  were  these  treasures,  there  was  one  other  object 
for  which  the  master  would  have  given  everything  else 
in  this  museum  of  curiosities,  and  the  secret  of  which  no 
eyes  but  his  own  had  yet  explored.  On  a sculptured 
slab  that  had  once  formed  a portion  of  the  architrave  of 
the  Cave  Temple  at  Elephanta  was  a splendid  marble 
miniature,  four  feet  high,  of  that  miracle  of  Saracenic 
architecture,  the  Taj  Mahal,  at  Agra.  The  elaborate 
carving  resembled  lace-work,  and  the  beauty  of  the  airy 
dome  and  slender,  glittering  minarets  of  this  mimic 
tomb  of  Noor-Mahal  could  find  no  parallel,  save  in  the 
superb  and  matchless  original. 

Filled  though  it  was  with  sparkling  bijouterie  that 
would  have  graced  the  Barberini  or  Strozzi  cabinets, 
the  glitter  of  the  room  was  cold  and  cheerless.  No 
rosy  memories  of  early,  happy  manhood  lingered  here  ; 
no  dewy  gleams  of  the  merry  morning  of  life,  when  hope 
painted  a peopled  and  smiling  world  ; no  magic  trifles 
that  prattled  of  the  spring-time  of  a heart  that,  in  wan- 
dering to  and  fro  through  the  earth,  had  fed  itself  with 
dust  and  ashes,  acrid  and  bitter  ; had  studiously  col- 
lected only  the  melancholy  symbols  of  mouldering  ruin, 
desolation,  and  death,  and  which  found  its  best  type  in 
the  Taj  Mahal,  that  glistened  so  mockingly  as  the  gas- 
light flickered  on  it. — St.  Elmo , 


Vol.  XXIV.— « 


WILSON,  James  Grant,  a Scottish-American 
biographer,  born  in  Edinburgh,  April  28,  1832. 
He  was  the  son  of  the  poet  William  Wilson,  who 
in  that  year  came  to  Poughkeepsie,  N.  Y.,  where 
the  son  was  educated.  Establishing  at  Chicago  the 
first  literary  journal  in  the  Northwest,  he  sold  out, 
became  a colonel,  afterward  a general,  in  the  Civil 
War,  and  subsequently  settled  in  New  York.  He 
has  been  on  important  Government  boards,  Presi- 
dent of  the  New  York  Genealogical  Society,  and 
has  held  other  prominent  offices.  Besides  ad- 
dresses and  articles,  he  has  published  Biographical 
Sketches  of  Illinois  Officers  (1862) ; Love  in  Letters 
(1867);  Life  of  U.  S.  Grant  (1868);  Life  of  Fitz - 
Greene  Halle ck  (1869);  Sketches  of  Illustrious  Sol- 
diers (1874);  Poets  and  Poetry  of  Scotland  (1876); 
Centennial  History  of  the  Diocese  of  New  York  (1886); 
Bryant  and  His  Friends  (1886);  Commodore  Isaac 
Hidl  and  the  Frigate  Constitution  (1889) ; The  Me- 
morial History  of  New  York  City  (1891-93),  and 
edited  The  Presidents  of  the  United  States  (1894). 
In  collaboration  with  Mr.  John  Fiske  he  has  ed- 
ited Appleton's  Cyclopaedia  of  American  Biography 
(6  vols.,  1886-89). 

THE  “CROAKERS.” 

The  amusing  series  of  verses  known  as  The  Croak » 
crsf  first  published  in  1819,  were  the  joint  produc- 

(34°J 


JAMES  GRANT  WILSON 


341 


tion  of  the  attached  friends  and  literary  partners,  Fitz- 
Greene  Halleck  and  Joseph  Rodman  Drake — the  “Da- 
mon and  Pythias  ” of  American  poets.  The  origin  of 
these  sprightly  jeux  d' esprit,  as  eagerly  looked  for  each 
evening  as  were  the  war-bulletins  of  a later  day,  may 
not  be  without  interest  to  the  authors’  troops  of  ad- 
mirers. Halleck  and  Drake  were  spending  a Sunday 
morning  with  Dr.  William  Langstaff,  an  eccentric  apoth- 
ecary and  an  accomplished  mineralogist,  with  whom  they 
were  both  intimate  (the  two  last  mentioned  were  pre- 
viously fellow-students  in  the  study  of  medicine  with 
Drs.  Bruce  and  Romayne),  when  Drake,  for  his  own  and 
his  friends’  amusement,  wrote  several  burlesque  stanzas 
To  Ennui,  Halleck  answering  them  in  some  lines  on 
the  same  subject.  The  young  poets  decided  to  send 
their  productions,  with  others  of  a similar  character,  to 
William  Coleman,  the  editor  of  the  Evening  Post.  If  he 
published  them,  they  would  write  more  ; if  not,  they 
would  offer  them  to  M.  M.  Noah,  of  the  National  Advo- 
cate j and,  if  he  declined  their  poetical  progeny,  they 
would  light  their  pipes  with  them.  Drake  accordingly 
sent  Coleman  three  pieces  of  his  own,  signed  “ Croak- 
er,” a signature  adopted  from  an  amusing  character  in 
Goldsmith’s  comedy  of  The  Good-Natured  Man.  To 
their  astonishment,  a paragraph  appeared  in  the  Post  the 
day  following,  acknowledging  their  receipt,  promising 
the  insertion  of  the  poems,  pronouncing  them  to  be  the 
productions  of  superior  taste  and  genius,  and  begging 
the  honor  of  a personal  acquaintance  with  the  author. 
The  lines  To  Ennui  appeared  March  10,  1819,  and  the 
others  in  almost  daily  succession  ; those  written  by  Mr. 
Halleck  being  sometimes  signed  “ Croaker  Junior,”  while 
those  which  were  their  joint  composition  generally  bore 
the  signature  of  “ Croaker  and  Co.” 

The  remark  made  by  Coleman  had  excited  public  at- 
tention, and  “The  Croakers  ” soon  became  a subject 
of  conversation  in  drawing-rooms,  book-stores,  coffee- 
houses on  Broadway,  and  throughout  the  city  ; they 
were,  in  short,  a town  topic.  The  two  friends  contrib- 
uted other  pieces  ; and  when  the  editor  again  expressed 
great  anxiety  to  be  acquainted  with  the  writer,  and  used 
a style  so  mysterious  as  to  excite  their  curiosity,  the  liter*- 


342 


JAMES  GRANT  WILSON 


ary  partners  decided  to  call  upon  him.  Halleck  ana  Drake 
accordingly,  one  evening,  went  together  to  Coleman’s 
residence  in  Hudson  Street,  and  requested  an  interview. 
They  were  ushered  into  the  parlor,  the  editor  soon  en- 
tered, the  young  poets  expressed  a desire  for  a few  min- 
utes’ strictly  private  conversation  with  him,  and,  the  door 
being  closed  and  locked,  Dr.  Drake  said — “ I am  Croaker, 
and  this  gentleman,  sir,  is  Croaker  Junior.”  Coleman 
stared  at  the  young  men  with  indescribable  and  unaf- 
fected astonishment,  at  length  exclaiming  : “ I had  no 
idea  that  we  had  such  talent  in  America  ! " Halleck, 
with  his  characteristic  modesty,  was  disposed  to  give 
to  Drake  all  the  credit ; but,  as  it  chanced  that  Coleman 
alluded  in  particularly  glowing  terms  to  one  of  the 
Croakers  that  was  wholly  his,  he  was  forced  to  be  silent, 
and  the  delighted  editor  continued  in  a strain  of  com- 
pliment and  eulogy  that  put  them  both  to  the  blush. 
Before  taking  their  leave,  the  poets  bound  Coleman 
over  to  the  most  profound  secrecy,  and  arranged  a plan 
of  sending  him  the  MSS.,  and  of  receiving  the  proofs, 
in  a manner  that  would  avoid  the  least  possibility  of 
the  secret  of  their  connection  with  “The  Croakers” 
being  discovered.  The  poems  were  copied  from  the 
originals  by  Langstaff,  that  their  handwriting  should 
not  divulge  the  secret,  and  were  either  sent  through 
the  mail,  or  taken  to  the  Evening  Post  office  by  Ben- 
jamin R.  Winthrop.  . . . 

Hundreds  of  imitations  of  “The  Croakers ” were 
daily  received  by  the  different  editors  of  New  York,  to 
all  of  which  they  gave  publicly  one  general  answer,  that 
they  lacked  the  genius,  spirit,  and  beauty  of  the  origi- 
nals. On  one  occasion  Coleman  showed  Halleck  fifteen 
he  had  received  in  a single  morning,  all  of  which,  with  a 
solitary  exception,  were  consigned  to  the  waste-basket. 
The  friends  continued  for  several  months  to  keep  the 
city  in  a blaze  of  excitement ; and  it  was  observed  by 
one  of  the  editors,  “that  so  great  was  the  wincing  and 
shrinking  at 4 The  Croakers,’  that  every  person  was  on 
tenter-hooks  ; neither  knavery  nor  folly  has  slept  quiet- 
ly since  our  first  commencement.” — Life  and  Letters  of 
Fit z-  Greene  Halleck* 


WILSON,  John,  a Scottish  essayist,  poet,  and 
novelist,  born  at  Paisley,  May  18,  1785  ; died  at 
Edinburgh,  April  3,  1854.  He  was  the  son  of  a 
prosperous  manufacturer ; was  educated  at  the 
University  of  Glasgow,  and  at  Oxford,  where  he 
took  his  Bachelor’s  degree  in  1807,  having  the  pre- 
ceding year  won  the  Newdigate  Prize  for  a poem 
on  “ The  Study  of  Greek  and  Roman  Architect- 
ure.” Soon  afterward  he  married  and  purchased 
the  pretty  estate  of  Elleray,  on  the  shore  of  Lake 
Windermere,  where  he  resided  for  several  years. 
He  was  noted  for  his  imposing  stature,  physical 
strength,  and  fondness  for  athletic  exercises.  Pe- 
cuniary reverses  came  upon  him,  and  he  was  com- 
pelled to  look  about  for  means  of  earning  a liveli- 
hood. He  went  to  Edinburgh,  and  entered  himself 
as  a member  of  the  Scottish  bar ; and  in  1820  was 
elected  Professor  of  Moral  Philosophy  in  the 
University  of  Edinburgh.  In  the  meantime  Will- 
iam Blackwood  had  in  1817  established  at  Edin- 
burgh the  magazine  which  bears  his  name.  Wil- 
son was  from  the  first  its  leading  spirit,  though 
Blackwood  was  its  actual  editor.  For  the  some- 
what mythical  editor  the  name  of  “ Christopher 
North”  was  adopted,  and  this  name  came  to  be 
applied  to  Wilson,  and  was  in  a manner  adopted 
by  him.  Wilson’s  connection  with  Blackwood' s 
Magazine  continued  from  October,  1817,  till  Sep- 

' j-wj 


34. 


JOHN  WILSON 


tember,  1852,  when  appeared  his  last  contribution, 
Christopher  Under  Canvas.  His  health  failing-  in 
1851,  the  Government  granted  him  a literary  pen- 
sion of  £300. 

Among  his  Blackwood  articles  are  the  series  en- 
titled Nodes  Ambrosiance  and  Recreations  of  Chris- 
topher North.  A collection  of  his  Works , edited  by 
his  son-in-law,  Professor  Ferrier,  has  been  made 
(1: 85  5—58).  Besides  the  various  Blackwood  papers, 
the  principal  works  of  Wilson  are  The  Isle  of 
Palms , and  Other  Poems  { 1812);  The  City  of  the 
Plague , and  Other  Poems  (1816) ; Lights  and  Shadows 
of  Scottish  Life  (1822)  ; The  Trials  of  Margaret 
Lyndsay  (1823);  The  Foresters  ( 1 8 24). 

YOUTHFUL  FRIENDSHIPS. 

Oh  ! blame  not  boys  for  so  soon  forgetting  one  an- 
other in  absence  or  in  death.  Yet  forgetting  is  not  just 
the  very  word.  Call  it  rather  a reconcilement  to  doom 
and  destiny  in  thus  obeying  a benign  law  of  nature  that 
soon  streams  sunshine  over  the  shadow  of  the  grave. 
Not  otherwise  could  all  the  ongoings  of  this  world  be 
continued.  The  nascent  spirit  outgrows  much  in  which 
it  once  found  all  delight ; and  thoughts  delightful  still 
— thoughts  of  the  faces  and  the  voices  of  the  dead — 
perish  not ; lying  sometimes  in  slumber,  sometimes  in 
sleep.  It  belongs  not  to  the  blessed  season  and  genius 
of  youth  to  hug  to  its  heart  useless  and  unavailing 
griefs.  Images  of  the  well-beloved,  when  they  themselves 
are  in  the  mould,  come  and  go,  no  unfrequent  visitants, 
through  the  meditative  hush  of  solitude.  But  our  main 
business — our  prime  joys  and  our  prime  sorrows — ought 
to  be,  must  be,  with  the  living.  Duty  demands  it ; and 
Love,  who  would  pine  to  death  over  the  bones  of  the 
dead,  soon  fastens  upon  other  objects  ; with  eyes  and 
voices  to  smile  and  whisper  an  answer  to  all  his  vows. 

• So  was  it  with  us.  Ere  the  midsummer  sun  had 
withered  the  flowers  that  Spring  has  sprinkled  over  our 


JOHN  WILSON 


345 


Godfrey's  grave,  youth  vindicated  its  own  right  to  hap- 
piness ; and  we  felt  that  we  did  wrong  to  visit  too  often 
that  corner  of  the  kirkyard.  No  fears  had  we  of  any 
too  oblivious  tendencies.  In  our  dreams  we  saw  him, 
most  often  all  alive  as  ever,  sometimes  a phantom  away 
from  that  grave.  If  the  morning  light  was  frequently 
hard  to  be  endured,  bursting  suddenly  upon  us  along 
with  the  feeling  that  he  was  dead,  it  more  frequently 
cheered  and  gladdened  us  with  resignation,  and  sent  us 
forth  a fit  playmate  to  the  dawn  that  rang  with  all 
sounds  of  joy.  Again  we  found  ourselves  anglingdown 
the  river  or  along  the  lock  ; once  more  following  the 
flight  of  the  falcon  along  the  woods,  eying  the  eagle  on 
the  echo-cliff.  . . . 

Days  passed  by  without  so  much  as  one  thought  of 
Emilius  Godfrey;  pursuing  our  pastime  with  all  our 
passion,  reading  our  books  intently,  just  as  if  he  had 
never  been.  But  often  and  often,  too,  we  thought  we 
saw  his  figure  coming  down  the  hill  straight  toward  us 
— his  very  figure-— we  could  not  be  deceived.  But  the 
love-raised  ghost  disappeared  on  a sudden ; the  grief- 
worn  spectre  melted  into  mist.  The  strength  that  for- 
merly had  come  from  his  counsels  now  began  to  grow 
up  of  itself  within  our  own  unassisted  being.  The  world 
of  nature  became  more  our  own,  moulded  and  modified 
by  all  our  own  feelings  and  fancies  ; and  with  a bolder 
and  more  original  eye  we  saw  the  smoke  from  the 
sprinkled  cottages,  and  saw  the  faces  of  the  mountain- 
eers on  their  way  to  their  work,  or  coming  and  goingto 
the  house  of  God. — Recreations  of  Christopher  North . 


WILSON,  Thomas  Woodrow,  an  American 
historian,  born  at  Staunton,  Va.,  December  28, 
1856.  He  was  graduated  from  Princeton  College 
in  1879;  he  studied  law  and  practised  as  an  attor- 
ney at  Atlanta,  Ga.,  for  two  years.  From  1883  to 
1885  he  studied  history  and  politics  at  Johns  Hop- 
kins University,  and  taught  history  at  Bryn  Mawr 
College,  1885-86,  serving  there  as  professor  of 
history  and  political  science,  1886-88.  After  a 
year  as  professor  of  the  same  studies  at  Wesleyan 
University  he  accepted  the  chair  of  jurisprudence 
at  Princeton  College  (1890).  Among  his  works 
are  Congressional  Government : A Study  in  Amer- 
ican Politics  (1885)  J The  State  (1889) ; Division  and 
Reunion , 1829-89  (one  of  the  Epochs  of  American 
History  series,  1893);  An  Old  Master , and  Other 
Political  Essays  (1893);  George  Washington  (1896)  ; 
Mere  Literature,  and  Other  Essays  (1896). 

Of  his  George  Washington,  a writer  in  the  Book- 
man says : “ It  is  clear  the  author  is  tracing  the 
evolution  of  a hero  rather  than  writing  the  biog- 
raphy of  a man.  This  is  indeed  the  tone  of  the 
book  throughout,  and  the  effect  produced  is  a lit- 
tle unreal,  as  far  as  the  personality  of  Washington 
is  concerned.  The  epic  style  grows  somewhat 
monotonous  at  times.  . . . It  is  compact  and 

forcible.  Almost  it  persuades  one  to  be  a hero- 
worshipper.” 


THOMAS  WOODROW  WILSON 


347 


A CALENDAR  OF  GREAT  AMERICANS. 

Before  a calendar  of  great  Americans  can  be  made  out, 
a valid  canon  of  Americanism  must  first  be  established. 
Not  every  great  man  born  and  bred  in  America  was  a 
great  “ American.”  Some  of  the  notable  men  born 
among  us  were  simply  great  Englishmen  ; others  had  in 
all  the  habits  of  their  thought  and  life  the  strong  flavor 
of  a peculiar  region,  and  were  great  New  Englanders 
or  great  Southerners  ; others,  masters  in  the  fields  of 
science  or  of  pure  thought,  showed  nothing  either  dis- 
tinctively national  or  characteristically  provincial,  and 
were  s'mply  great  men  ; while  a few  displayed  old  cross- 
strains of  blood  or  breeding.  The  great  Englishmen 
bred  in  America,  like  Hamilton  and  Madison  ; the  great 
provincials,  like  John  Adams  and  Calhoun  ; the  authors 
of  such  thought  as  might  have  been  native  to  any 
clime,  like  Asa  Gray  and  Emerson  ; and  the  men  of 
mixed  breed,  like  Jefferson  and  Benton — must  be  ex- 
cluded from  our  present  list.  We  must  pick  out  men 
who  have  created  or  exemplified  a distinctively  Ameri- 
can standard  and  type  of  greatness. 

To  make  such  a selection  is  not  to  create  an  artificial 
standard  of  greatness,  or  to  claim  that  greatness  is  in 
any  case  hallowed  or  exalted  merely  because  it  is  Amer- 
ican. It  is  simply  to  recognize  a peculiar  stamp  of 
character,  a special  make-up  of  mind  and  faculties,  as 
the  specific  product  of  our  national  life,  not  displacing 
or  eclipsing  talents  of  a different  kind,  but  supplement- 
ing them,  and  so  adding  to  the  world’s  variety.  There 
is  an  American  type  of  men.  and  those  who  have  exhib- 
ited this  type  with  a certain  unmistakable  distinction 
and  perfection  have  been  great  “ Americans.”  It  has 
required  the  utmost  variety  of  character  and  energy  to 
establish  a great  nation,  with  a polity  at  once  free  and 
firm,  upon  this  continent,  and  no  sound  type  of  manliness 
could  here  have  been  dispensed  with  in  the  effort.  We 
could  no  more  have  done  without  our  great  Englishmen, 
to  keep  the  past  steadily  in  mind  and  make  every  change 
conservative  of  principle,  than  we  could  have  done  with- 
out the  men  whose  whole  impulse  was  forward,  whose 


348 


THOMAS  WOODROW  WILSON 


whole  genius  was  for  origination,  natural  masters  of  the 
art  of  subduing  a wilderness. 


We  shall  not  in  the  future  have  to  take  one  type  of 
Americanism  at  a time.  The  frontier  is  gone  : it  has 
reached  the  Pacific.  The  country  grows  rapidly  homo- 
geneous. With  the  same  pace  it  grows  various,  and 
multiform  in  all  its  life.  The  man  of  the  single  or 
local  type  cannot  any  longer  deal  in  the  great  manner 
with  any  national  problem.  The  great  men  of  our  fut- 
ure must  be  of  the  composite  type  of  greatness  : sound- 
hearted,  hopeful,  confident  of  the  validity  of  liberty, 
tenacious  of  the  deeper  principles  of  American  institu- 
tions, but  with  the  old  rashness  schooled  and  sobered, 
and  instinct  tempered  by  instruction.  They  must  be 
wise  with  an  adult,  not  with  an  adolescent  wisdom. 
Some  day  we  shall  be  of  one  mind,  our  ideals  fixed,  our 
purposes  harmonized,  our  nationality  complete  and  con- 
sentaneous : then  will  come  our  great  literature  and  our 
greatest  men. 


WINCH  ELL,  Alexander,  an  American  geol- 
ogist, born  at  North  East,  Dutchess  County,  N. 
Y.,  December  31,  1824;  died  at  Ann  Arbor,  Mich., 
February  19,  1891.  He  was  graduated  at  Wes- 
leyan University,  Middletown,  Conn.,  and  was 
Professor  of  Physics  and  Civil  Engineering  in  the 
University  of  Michigan,  1853-55  ; of  Geology  and 
Natural  Science,  1855-72,  holding  also  a like  pro- 
fessorship in  the  Kentucky  University,  1866-67. 
He  was  Chancellor  of  the  Syracuse  University, 
N.  Y.,  from  1872-74,  and  professor  of  geology 
and  zoology  there  in  1877.  From  1879  he  was 
Professor  of  Geology  and  Palaeontology  at  Michi- 
gan University,  and  State  Geologist,  1859-62  and 
1869-71.  Besides  scientific  papers  and  official  re- 
ports, he  wrote  some  very  able  books,  considered 
both  as  scientific  and  literary  productions,  such 
as  Sketches  of  Creation  (1870) ; Geology  of  the  Stars 
(1872);  Doctrine  of  Evolution  (1874) ; Thoughts  on 
Causality  (1875);  Lay  Theology  (1876);  Reconcilia- 
tion of  Science  and  Religion  (1877)  » Preadamites 
(1880);  Sparks  from  a Geologist' s Hammer  (1881); 
World- Life  (1883);  Geological  Excursions  (1884); 
Walks  and  Talks  in  the  Geological  Field  (1886); 
Shall  We  Teach  Geology  ? (1889). 

Of  Walks  and  Talks  in  the  Geological  Field , the 
Critic  says:  “ It  was  no  light  task  that  Dr.  Win- 
ched undertook  when  he  proposed  to  popularize 
(349) 


350 


ALEXANDER  WINCHELL 


geology,  for  although  the  subject  is  one  that  sug- 
gests poetry  and  the  exercise  of  literary  skill,  there 
has  been,  and  still  is,  such  constant  quarrelling 
among  professional  geologists  that  the  greatest 
care  was  necessary  to  make  use  of  such  facts  as  all 
the  4 professionals  * admit,  and  avoid  the  bones  of 
contention.  In  this  Dr.  Winchell  succeeded.  It  is 
a good  book,  a truthful  book,  that  will  hold  its 
own,  however  numerous  the  volumes  akin  to  it 
that  the  near  future  may  produce.” 

MIND  IN  MATTER. 

A human  organism  with  all  its  parts  perfect,  and  all 
its  parts  in  harmonious  action,  is  a splendid  mechanism 
which  can  never  cease  to  awaken  admiration  and  won- 
der. While  we  contemplate  it,  alas,  its  activities  cease. 
A powerful  current  of  electricity  has  passed  through 
the  frame,  and  a life  is  extinct.  The  change  which  we 
witness  is  appalling.  The  eye  has  lost  its  light  ; the 
voice  gives  forth  no  more  intelligence  ; the  muscles  cease 
to  grasp  the  implement  ; the  fabric  of  a man  now  lies 
prone,  motionless,  speechless,  insensible,  dead — a stu- 
pendous and  total  change.  But  what  is  changed  ? Not 
the  mechanism.  The  heart  is  still  in  its  place,  with  all 
its  valves  ; the  brain  shows  no  lesion  ; the  muscles  are 
all  ready  to  act ; every  part  remains  as  it  was  in  life. 
Neither  chemistry  nor  the  microscope  detects,  as  yet,  a 
material  change.  But  something  has  gone  out  of  the 
mechanism,  for  it  is  not  as  it  was — something  inscruta- 
ble, but  yet  something  which  ruled  the  mechanism — 
sustaining  its  action,  lighting  the  eye,  giving  informa- 
tion to  the  tongue,  making  of  this  machinery  absolutely 
all  that  which  led  us  to  say,  “Here  is  a man.”  The 
man  has  gone  out  and  left  only  his  silent  workshop  be- 
hind. 

Consider  the  life-powers  in  action.  The  organism  is 
in  process  of  growth.  A common  fund  of  assimilative 
material  is  provided  by  the  digestive  organs.  Out  of 
this,  atom  by  atom  is  selected  and  built  into  the  vari- 


ALEXANDER  WINCH  ELL  25 1 

ous  tissue-fabrics.  Here  such  atoms  are  selected  as  the 
formation  of  bone  requires ; there,  the  atoms  suited  for 
nerve  or  brain  structure  ; in  another  place,  the  material 
of  which  muscles  are  made.  If,  unfortunately,  the  lime 
should  be  brought  to  be  worked  up  in  the  muscle-fac- 
tory, or  the  nerve-stuff  to  be  made  into  bone,  the  whole 
organism  would  be  thrown  into  disorder.  Nice  selec- 
tion of  material  is  indispensable.  Then  notice  the 
building  of  the  bones.  In  one  place  the  framework  is 
so  laid  that  the  filling  up  will  result  in  a flat  bone.  It 
is  to  be  a shoulder-blade,  or  a portion  of  the  skull.  In 
another  place  the  framework  is  elongated  ; it  is  to  be  a 
long  bone.  The  humerus  is  never  built  into  the  skull, 
nor  the  shoulder-blade  into  the  sole  of  the  foot.  Every 
bone  is  constructed  for  its  place  and  its  function.  The 
whole  system  of  bones,  moreover,  is  conformed  to  a 
definite  fundamental  plan  of  structure — it  is  accord- 
ing to  the  plan  of  a vertebrate.  Now,  selection  of 
appropriate  material  is  an  act  of  intelligence.  The 
determination  of  one  form  of  structure  rather  than 
another  implies  discriminating  intelligence  and  ex- 
ecutive will.  The  conformation  of  the  total  system  of 
structures  in  the  organism  to  an  ideal  plan  implies,  first, 
a conception  of  the  plan  ; secondly,  a perception  of 
fitness  between  the  plan  and  each  particular  tissue  in 
process  of  formation.  Certainly,  we  must  say  that  here 
mind  is  at  work.  But  is  it  the  mind  of  the  animal  or 
plant?  Every  person  can  answer  for  himself  whether 
he  made  his  own  bones.  The  question  is  absurd.  Is 
the  mind  evinced  possessed  by  the  matter?  Do  these 
atoms  and  molecules  move  and  arrange  themselves  by 
an  intelligence  and  choice  of  their  own  ? Has  each  one 
a conception  of  the  plan  to  which  they  so  consentane- 
ously work  ? Do  they  intelligently  maintain  the  proc- 
esses of  digestion,  blood  purification,  assimilation,  and' 
tissue-building  ? How  do  they  conceive,  think,  and  will 
without  brain  ? How  select  without  eyes  or  hands  ? 
Whoever  knew  intelligence  acting  without  brain  ? But, 
it  is  conceivable,  you  say.  Yes,  though  it  is  not  a 
brainless  molecule.  There  is  intelligence  acting  in  the 
organism,  which  does  not  belong  to  the  matter  or  the 
individual;  whose  intelligence  is  it?  Intelligence  is 


352 


ALEXANDER  WINCH  ELL 


an  attribute  ; it  belongs  to  being.  What  being,  then, 
acts  in  the  living  organism  ? It  is  the  Omnipresent 
Being.  . . . 

Plan  is  the  product  of  thought ; it  is  a demonstration 
of  the  existence  and  presence  and  activity  of  mind.  If 
the  material  world  is  underlaid  and  pervaded  and  oper- 
ated by  plan,  method,  law,  then  the  world  is  a constant 
revelation  of  a present  intelligence,  an  omnipresent  and 
omniscient  Being. 

There  is  one  plan  which  underlies  all  other  plans. 
In  a brief  and  condensed  way,  I have  attempted  to 
show  that  the  plans  exemplified  in  organic  life  and  the 
plans  exemplified  in  the  formation  of  worlds  are  only 
special  exemplifications  of  the  all-embracing  plan  of 
evolution  .—  Walks  and  Talks  in  the  Geological  Field . 


WINSLOW,  Edward,  a British  miscellaneous 
writer,  one  of  the  Pilgrim  Fathers,  born  at  Droit- 
wich,  in  Worcestershire,  October  19,  1 595  ; died 
at  sea,  near  Jamaica,  May  8,  1655.  He  was  one 
of  the  voyagers  on  the  Mayflower , and,  in  conjunc- 
tion with  William  Bradford,  kept  a journal  of  the 
events  of  the  first  year  in  the  Plymouth  Colony. 
In  1623  he  went  to  England  as  agent  of  the  Ply- 
mouth Colony,  and  while  there  put  forth  his 
pamphlet,  Good  Newes  from  New  England.  On 
his  return  he  brought  with  him  the  first  live  stock 
introduced  into  New  England*  In  1633  he  was 
elected  Governor  of  the  Colony,  In  1635  he  again 
visited  England,  and  obtained  a renewal  of  the 
right  of  self-government  at  Plymouth ; but  Thomas 
Morton,  the  Episcopalian  Royalist,  procured  his 
imprisonment  on  various  charges.  He  was  soon 
released,  and  was  re-elected  Governor  in  1636,, 
and  again  in  1644.  He  returned  to  England  in 
1649,  was  employed  there  under  the  Cromwellian 
Government,  and  in  1655  was  sent  to  the  West  In- 
dies as  one  of  the  commissioners  appointed  to  de- 
vise and  superintend  attack  upon  the  Spanish  set- 
tlements, but  died  on  the  voyage,  and  was  buried 
in  Jamaica. 

“ Winslow/*  says  Professor  C.  F.  Richardson, 
44  was  a sufficiently  modest  chronicler  of  his  sights 
and  doings,  his  best  work,  though  not  his  most 


354 


EDWARD  WINSLOW 


ambitious,  being  the  journal  which  he  wrote  in 
connection  with  William  Bradford.  . . . On 

the  whole,  it  is  well  done,  though  with  little  pre- 
tence to  fine  or  very  careful  writing.  Truth  is 
everywhere  apparent  in  the  record ; and  the  in- 
tensity of  the  writers  seldom  interfered  with  their 
common-sense  and  discretion.  This  journal  con- 
tained many  a vivid  picture  of  savage  life  on  the  4 
new  shore.” 

FIRST  IMPRESSIONS  OF  NEW  ENGLAND. 

For  the  temper  of  the  air  here,  it  agreeth  well  with 
that  in  England  ; and  if  there  be  any  difference  at  all, 
this  is  somewhat  hotter  in  summer.  Some  think  it  to 
be  colder  in  winter,  but  I cannot  of  experience  so  say. 
The  air  is  very  clear,  and  not  foggy,  as  hath  been  re- 
ported. I never  in  my  life  remember  a more  season- 
able year  than  we  have  here  enjoyed  ; and  if  we  have 
once  both  kine,  horses,  and  sheep,  I make  no  question 
but  men  might  live  as  contented  here  as  in  any  part  of 
the  world.  The  country  wanteth  only  industrious  men 
to  employ  ; for  it  would  grieve  your  hearts  if,  as  I,  you 
had  seen  so  many  miles  together  by  goodly  rivers  un- 
inhabited ; and,  withal,  to  consider  those  parts  of  the 
world  wherein  you  live  to  be  even  greatly  burthened 
with  abundance  of  people. — Letter  : 1622 . 

FIRST  INTERVIEW  WITH  MASSASOIT. 

In  his  person  he  is  a very  lusty  man,  in  his  best  years, 
an  able  body,  grave  of  countenance,  and  spare  of  speech  ; 
in  his  attire  little  or  nothing  differing  from  the  rest  of 
his  followers,  only  in  a great  chain  of  white  bone  beads 
about  his  neck  ; and  at  it,  behind  his  neck,  hangs  a little 
bag  of  tobacco.  His  face  was  painted  of  a sad,  red-like 
murrey,  and  oiled  both  head  and  face,  that  he  looked 
greasily.  All  his  followers  likewise  were  in  their  faces, 
in  part  or  in  whole,  painted,  some  black,  some  red,  some 
yellow,  and  some  white,  some  with  crosses  and  other 


EBWARD  WINSLOW 


m 


antic  works  ; some  had  skins  on  them,  and  some  naked  ; 
all  tall,  strong  men  in  appearance.  . . . 

One  thing  I forgot : The  king  had  in  his  bosom,  hang- 
ing in  a string,  a great,  long  knife.  He  marvelled  much 
at  our  trumpet,  and  some  of  the  men  would  sound  it  as 
well  as  they  could.  Samoset  and  Squanto,  they  stayed 
all  night  with  us  ; and  the  king  and  all  his  men  lay  all 
night  in  the  woods,  not  above  half  an  English  mile  from 
us,  and  all  their  wives  and  women  with  them.  They 
said  that  within  eight  or  nine  days  they  would  come  and 
set  corn  on  the  other  side  of  the  brook,  and  dwell  there 
all  summer  ; which  is  hard  by  us.  That  night  [March 
22,  1621]  we  kept  good  watch,  but  there  was  no  appear- 
ance of  danger. — Winslow's  Journal . 


Vol.  XXXV.— 23 


WINSOR,  Justin,  an  American  historian  and 
bibliographer,  born  in  Boston,  January  2,  1831 : 
died  at  Cambridge,  Mass.,  October  22,  1897.  He 
studied  at  Harvard  (which  subsequently  conferred 
upon  him  the  honorary  degree  of  LL.D.)  and  af- 
terward in  Germany.  In  1868  he  was  made  Su- 
perintendent of  the  Boston  Public  Library,  and 
in  1877  Librarian  of  Harvard  College.  From  1876 
to  1886  he  was  President  of  the  American  Li- 
brary Association.  Among  the  works  which  he 
wrote  or  edited  were  The  History  of  Duxbury , 
Mass.  (1849);  Songs  of  Unity  (1859)  5 Bibliography 
of  the  Original  Quartos  and  Folios  of  Shakespeare 
(1876);  Handbook  of  the  Revolution  (1880);  Brad- 
ford's History  of  Plymouth  (1881)  ; Arnold's  Expedi- 
tion Against  Quebec  (1886) ; The  Manuscript  Sources 
of  American  History  (1887);  Narrative  and  Critical 
History  of  the  United  States , written  partly  by 
himself  (of  which  Vol.  I.  appeared  in  1881,  Vol. 
VII.  in  1888);  Review  of  the  2 goth  Anniversary  of 
the  Founding  of  Harvard  College  (1887)  ; Christopher 
Columbus  (1891) ; Cartier  to  Frontenac  (1894).  From 
1877  on  he  prepared  a large  annual  volume  of  the 
Harvard  University  Bulletin , from  which  we  take 
a small  part  of  an  exhaustive  paper  on  The  Bibli- 
ography of  Ptolemy's  Geography.  Some  seventy 
editions  of  this  are  described,  that  of  1540  the 
most  minutely. 


(356) 


JUSTIN  WINSOR 


357 


SEBASTIAN  MONSTER  AND  HIS  MAPS  OF  THE  NEW 
WORLD. 

Sebastian  Miinster  was  born  in  1489,  and  died  of  the 
plague  in  1552.  In  1532  he  had  already  contributed  a 
Map  of  the  World  and  had  described  it  in  the  Novas 
Orbis , which  was  published  at  Basle  in  1532,  and  is  usu- 
ally ascribed  to  Grynaeus,  because  his  name  is  signed 
to  the  Preface.  Munster’s  1532  map  closely  resembles 
the  Schonen  and  Frankfort  globes  in  the  shape  of  North 
America,  and  in  the  placing  of  “ Corterealis,”  as  well  as 
the  severance  of  South  America  by  a strait.  The  north- 
ern land  is  called  “Terre  de  Cuba.”  The  southern  part 
is  drawn  broad  in  the  northerly  part,  but  it  closely  con- 
tracts, making  the  lower  portion  long  and  narrow  ; and 
it  bears  these  words  : “Parias,”  “Canibali,”  “ America,” 
“Terra  Nova,”  “ Priscilia.”  This  1532  map,  being  so 
much  behind  the  current  knowledge  of  America,  was 
not  altogether  creditable  to  Munster,  and  in  1540  he 
undertook  the  editing  of  the  edition  of  Ptolemy  now 
under  consideration.  In  this  new  edition  he  placed  the 
following  maps,  which  are  of  interest  in  the  history  of 
American  cartography  : 

(1.)  Typus  Universalis , an  elliptical  map,  with  America 
on  the  left ; except  that  the  western  part  of  America, 
called  “ Temistatan,”  is  carried  to  the  Asia  side  of  the 
map.  In  the  north  a narrow  neck  of  land  extending 
west,  widens  into  “Islandia,”  with  “ Thyle,”  an  island, 
south  of  it ; and  still  farther  westward  it  becomes  “Terra 
nova  sine  de  Bacalhos.”  South  of  this  is  a strait  marked 
“ Per  hoc  fretum  iter  patet  ad  Molucas.”  The  north- 
ern boundary  of  the  western  end  of  the  strait  is  “ India 
Superior.”  South  of  it,  and  opposite  Bacalhos,  is  a tri- 
angular land,  without  name,  but  with  an  off-lying  island, 
“Cortereal.”  Its  western  shore  is  washed  by  a “ Ver- 
ranzano  Sea,”  which  nearly  severs  it  from  “ Terra  Flor- 
ida.” South  America  is  so  vaguely  drawn  on  its  west- 
ern bounds  that  its  connection  with  North  America  is 
uncertain.  It  is  called  “America,  seu  Insula  Brazilii.” 
“ Magellan’s  Straits  ” separate  it  from  the  Antarctic 
Sands ; and  these  straits  are  for  the  first  time  shown 


358 


JUSTIN’  WINSCM 


on  any  Ptolemaic  map. — (2.)  Nava  Insula  xxvt.  nova 
Tabula.  This  is  No.  45  of  the  whole,  or  No.  17  of  the 
twenty-two  maps  showing  both  Americas.  Kohl  delin- 
eates it,  dating  it  erroneously  1530  ; and  Hubert  H.  Ban- 
croft copies  the  error.  A similar  gulf,  from  the  north- 
west, projects  down  North  America,  as  in  the  other  map. 
On  South  America  is  the  legend,  “Insula  Atlantia, 
quam  vocant  Brazilii  et  Americam.” 

The  title  of  this  edition  of  1540  is,  Geographia  Univer- 
salis, Vetus  et  Nova , complectens  Claudii  Alexandrini  enna- 
nationes , etc.  This  edition  consists  of  forty-eight  maps^ 
of  which  twenty-six  relate  to  the  Old  World,  and  twen- 
ty-two to  the  New.  It  is  of  interest  now  to  inquire 
what  explorations  had  been  followed,  and  what  maps 
had  been  produced  since  the  edition  of  1522  which 
could  have  been  of  assistance  to  Munster  in  drafting 
these  new  theories  of  the  general  contour  of  the  Amer 
lean  continent. 

The  distinctive  feature  of  Munster's  map — the  sea 
which  nearly  severs  North  America — is  traced  to  the 
explorations  of  Giovanni  de  Verrezano,  in  1524.  Into 
the  questions  against  the  general  credence  imposed  in 
these  explorations,  it  is  not  necessary  to  enter  here.  The 
belief  in  the  story  first  found  public  cartographical  ex- 
pression in  the  map  under  consideration  ; and  Munster 
may  possibly  have  used  Verrezano’s  charts,  which  are 
now  lost.  . . . 

The  validity  of  the  claims  for  Giovanni  de  Verrezano 
largely  rests,  however,  on  a planisphere  of  about  1529, 
made  by  Hieronymus  de  Verrezano,  measuring  51  by 
102  inches,  which  was  discovered  in  the  Collegio  Ro- 
mano de  Propaganda  Fide,  in  the  Museo  Borgiano  at 
Rome.  It  is  not  certain  that  this  map  is  an  original 
and  it  may  be  a copy.  It  was  mentioned  by  Von  Mur 
in  1801,  referring  to  a letter  of  Cardinal  Borgia  of 
1795.  It  was  again  mentioned  by  Million  in  1807. 
General  attention  was  first  directed  to  it  in  1852  in 
Thomassy’s  Les  Papes  G'eographes.  Two  imperfect  pho- 
tographs of  the  map  were  procured  for  the  American 
Geographical  Society  in  1871,  and  it  was  described  bj 
Mr.  Brevoort  in  their  Journal  for  1873.  Reductions  of 
it  are  given  in  C.  P.  Daly’s  Early  Cartography j in  the 


JUSTIN  WINSOR 


359 


opposing  monographs  of  Brevoort,  Ve rrezano,  the  Navi- 
gator (1874),  and  Murphy’s  Voyages  of  Verrezano  (1875). 
Brevoort  also  gives  an  enlarged  section  of  it,  and  for 
comparison  the  same  coast  from  the  Spanish  Mappa 
Mu?idi  of  1527.  Brevoort  is  also  of  the  opinion  that 
Hieronymus  Verrezano  got  his  Western  Sea  from  Ovie- 
do’s Somario  of  1526.  Mr.  De  Costa,  in  the  Magazine 
of  American  History , August,  1878,  gives  a reduction 
from  Mr.  Murphy’s  engraving,  and  an  enlarged  section, 
in  which  he  inserted  the  names  which  were  left  obscure 
in  the  photograph  from  which  Mr.  Murphy  worked. 
Mr.  De  Costa  repeats  his  various  maps,  and  sums  up 
the  subject  in  his  Verrezano , the  Explorer  (1881).  The 
last  word  on  the  subject  is  said  by  Mr.  J.  Carson  Bre- 
voort in  Magazine  of  American  History , February  and 
July,  1882. — The  Harvard  University  Bulletin , 1887. 


WINTER,  William,  an  American  dramatic 
critic  and  poet,  born  at  Gloucester,  Mass.,  July 
15,  1836.  After  passing  through  the  Cambridge 
High  School  he  studied  law  at  the  Harvard  Law 
School,  and  was  admitted  to  the  bar,  but  devoted 
himself  to  literature  rather  than  to  legal  practice. 
In  1859  he  took  up  his  permanent  residence  in 
New  York,  and  contributed  to  various  peri- 
odicals, his  specialty  being  literary  reviews  and 
dramatic  criticism.  Since  1865  he  has  been  the 
dramatic  editor  of  the  New  York  Tribune . He 
has  put  forth  the  following  small  volumes  of 
poems  : The  Convent , and  Other  Poems  (1854)  ; The 
Queen  s Domain,  and  Other  Poems  (1858)  ; My  Wit- 
ness: a Book  of  Verse  (1871)  ; Thistledown  : a Book 
of  Lyrics  (1878).  A complete  edition  of  his  poems 
was  published  in  1881.  His  prose  works  mainly 
relate,  directly  or  indirectly,  to  the  dramatic  art  \ 
Edwin  Booth  in  Twelve  Characters  (1871);  A Trip 
to  England  (1879);  The  Jeff er sons  (1881);  English 
Rambles  (1884);  Henry  Irving  (1885)  ; Shakespeare" s 
England  (1886) ; Gray  Days  and  Gold,  a volume  of 
poems  (1891);  Old  Shrines  and  Ivy  (1892);  Shadows 
of  the  Stage,  three  series  (1892,  1893,  1895),  and 
The  Life  and  Art  of  Edwin  Booth  (1894).  He  has 
edited,  with  biographical  sketches,  the  Remains 
of  his  early  deceased  associates,  George  Arnold 
and  Fitz- James  O’Brien. 

(360) 


WILLIAM  WINTER 


AFTER  ALL. 

The  apples  are  ripe  in  the  orchard, 

And  the  work  of  the  reaper  is  done, 

And  the  golden  woodlands  redden 
In  the  blood  of  the  dying  sun. 

At  the  cottage  door  the  grandsire 
Sits  pale  in  his  easy-chair, 

While  a gentle  wind  of  twilight 
Plays  with  his  silver  hair. 

A woman  is  kneeling  beside  him; 

A fair  young  head  is  prest, 

In  the  first  wild  passion  of  sorrow, 

Against  his  aged  breast. 

And  far  from  over  the  distance 
The  faltering  echoes  come 
Of  the  flying  blast  of  trumpet 
And  the  rattling  roll  of  drum. 

Then  the  grandsire  speaks  in  a whisper* — 

“ The  end  no  man  can  see  ; 

But  we  give  him  to  our  country, 

And  we  give  our  prayers  to  Thee  ! ” 

The  violets  star  the  meadows, 

The  rose-buds  fringe  the  door, 

And  over  the  grassy  orchard 
The  pink-white  blossoms  pour. 

But  the  grandsire’s  chair  is  empty, 

And  the  cottage  is  dark  and  still ; 

There’s  a nameless  grave  on  the  battle-field, 
And  a new  one  under  the  hill  ; 

And  a pallid,  tearless  woman 
By  the  cold  hearth  sits  alone ; 

And  the  old  clock  in  the  corner 
Ticks  on  with  a steady  tone. 

AN  EMPTY  HEART. 

(Lines  to  a beautiful  lady,  sent  with  a heart-shaped  jewel  box.) 

Well,  since  our  lot  must  be  to  part 

(These  lots — how  they  do  push  and  pull  one  !) 

I send  you  here  an  empty  heart, 


362 


WILLIAM  WINTER 


But  send  it  from  a very  full  one. 

My  little  hour  of  joy  is  done, 

But  every  vain  regret  I smother, 

With  murm’ring,  “ When  you  see  the  one, 
Think  kindly  sometimes  of  the  other.” 

This  heart  must  always  do  your  will, 

This  heart  your  maid  can  fetch  and  carry, 

This  heart  will  faithful  be,  and  still 
Will  not  importune  you  to  marry. 

That  other,  craving  hosts  of  things, 

Would  throb  and  flutter,  every  minute  ; 

But  this,  except  it  hold  your  rings, 

Will  mutely  wait  with  nothing  in  it. 

Oh,  happy  heart ! that  finds  its  bliss 
In  pure  affection  consecrated  ! 

But  happier  far  the  heart,  like  this, 

That  heeds  not  whether  lone  or  mated ; 

That  stands  unmoved  in  beauty’s  eyes, 

That  knows  not  if  you  leave  or  take  it, 

That  is  not  hurt  though  you  despise, 

And  quite  unconscious  when  you  break  it. 

That  other  heart  would  burn,  and  freeze, 

And  plague,  and  hamper,  and  perplex  you ; 

But  this  will  always  stand  at  ease, 

And  never  pet  and  never  vex  you. 

Go,  empty  heart ! and  if  she  lift 
Your  little  lid  this  prayer  deliver ; 

MAh,  look  with  kindness  on  the  gift, 

And  think  with  kindness  on  the  giver/* 


WINTHROP,  John,  an  American  historian, 
first  Governor  of  the  Colony  of  Massachusetts 
Bay,  born  at  Groton,  England,  January  12,  1587; 
died  in  Boston,  Mass.,  March  26,  1649.  His  father 
and  grandfather  were  eminent  lawyers,  and  he 
himself  was  bred  to  the  law.  At  eighteen  he 
was  made  a Justice  of  the  Peace,  and  was  held 
in  the  highest  repute  for  his  learning  and  piety. 
In  1629  he  was  chosen  head  of  a company  to 
establish  a new  colony  on  Massachusetts  Bay. 
He  sold  his  considerable  estate,  and  after  a voy- 
age of  two  months  landed  at  Salem,  June  12, 
1630.  Five  days  afterward  he  set  out  through 
the  forests,  and  selected  the  peninsula  of  Shaw- 
mut  as  the  site  of  a settlement,  to  which  was  given 
the  name  of  Boston  in  honor  of  their  pastor, 
whose  birthplace  was  Boston,  England.  Win- 
throp  was  elected  Governor  of  the  Colony  in  1634, 
and  by  successi  ye  re-elections  was  Governor,  with 
the  exception  of  two  short  intervals,  until  his 
death.  On  his  voyage  out  he  wrote  a short  trac- 
tate, A Model  of  Christian  Charity , and  kept  a mi- 
nute Journal  of  events— public,  social,  and  private 
— extending  from  1630  to  1649.  This  has  been 
published  under  the  somewhat  inapposite  title,  The 
History  of  New  England  (2  vols.,  1826).  In  1645 
he — then  being  Deputy-Governor — was  arraigned 
before  the  General  Court  upon  charge  of  having 

(363) 


3^4 


JOHN  WINTHROP 


exceeded  his  authority.  He  was  triumphantly 
acquitted,  and  the  speech  which  he  thereafter  de- 
livered is  the  most  notable  part  of  his  History. 

His  eldest  son,  also  John  Winthrop  (1605-76), 
obtained  from  Charles  II.  a charter  for  the  Colony 
of  Connecticut,  of  which  he  was  Governor  for  the 
last  fourteen  years  of  his  life. 

WINTHROP’S  NOCTURNAL  ADVENTURE. 

The  Governor  being  at  his  farm-house  at  Mistick, 
walked  out  after  supper  and  took  a piece  in  his  hand, 
supposing  he  might  see  a wolf.  And  being  about  half 
a mile  off  it  grew  suddenly  dark,  so  as  in  going  home  he 
mistook  his  path,  and  went  on  till  he  came  to  a little 
house  of  Sagamore  John,  which  stood  empty.  There 
he  stayed  ; and  having  a piece  of  match  in  his  pocket 
(for  he  always  carried  about  him  match  and  a compass, 
and  in  summer-time  snakeweed)  he  made  a good  fire 
near  the  house,  and  lay  down  upon  some  old  mats  which 
he  found  there,  and  so  spent  the  night,  sometimes  walk- 
ing by  the  fire,  sometimes  singing  psalms,  and  some- 
times getting  wood ; but  could  not  sleep.  It  was 
through  God’s  mercy  a warm  night,  but  a little  before 
day  it  began  to  rain,  and  having  no  cloak,  he  made  a 
shift  by  a long  pole  to  climb  up  into  the  house.  In  the 
morning  there  came  thither  an  Indian  squaw  ; but  per- 
ceiving her  before  she  had  opened  the  door  he  barred 
her  out.  Yet  she  stayed  there  a great  while,  essaying 
to  get  in  ; and  at  last  she  went  away,  and  he  returned 
safe  home,  his  servants  having  been  much  perplexed  for 
him,  and  having  walked  about  and  shot  off  pieces,  and 
hallooed  in  the  night ; but  he  heard  them  not. — History 
of  New  England. 

A PURITAN  OPINION  OF  LITERARY  WOMEN. 

Mr.  Hopkins,  the  Governor  of  Hartford,  upon  Con- 
necticut, came  to  Boston,  and  brought  his  wife  with  him 
(a  godly  young  woman,  and  of  special  parts),  who  was 
fallen  into  a sad  infirmity,  the  loss  of  her  understanding 


JOHN  WINTHROP 


365 


and  reason,  which  had  been  growing  upon  her  divers 
years,  by  occasion  of  her  giving  herself  wholly  to  read- 
ing and  writing,  and  had  written  many  books.  Her 
husband,  being  very  loving  and  tender  of  her,  was  loath 
to  grieve  her  ; but  he  saw  his  error  when  it  was  too  late. 
For  if  she  had  attended  her  household  affairs,  and  such 
things  as  belong  to  women,  and  not  gone  out  of  her  way 
and  calling  to  meddle  in  such  things  as  are  proper  for 
men,  whose  minds  are  stronger,  etc.,  she  had  kept  her 
wits,  and  might  have  improved  them  usefully  and  hon- 
orably in  the  place  God  had  set  for  her. 

He  brought  her  to  Boston,  and  left  her  with  her 
brother,  one  Mr.  Yale,  a merchant,  to  try  what  means 
might  be  had  here  for  her.  But  no  help  could  be  had. 
— The  History  of  New  England. 


WINTHROP,  Robert  Charles,  an  American 
orator  and  statesman,  born  in  Boston,  May  12, 
1809 ; died  there,  November  16, 1894.  He  was  a de- 
scendant, in  the  sixth  generation,  of  the  first  John 
Winthrop;  was  graduated  at  Harvard  in  1828; 
studied  law,  was  admitted  to  the  bar  in  1831 ; but, 
being  possessed  of  an  ample  fortune,  did  not  enter 
upon  practice.  In  1834  he  was  elected  to  the 
Legislature  of  Massachusetts ; and  in  1840  was 
elected  a Representative  in  Congress  and  was 
chosen  Speaker  of  the  House  in  1848.  In  1851  he 
received  the  highest  vote  of  three  candidates  for 
the  governorship  of  Massachusetts ; but,  failing 
of  a majority  of  the  whole  vote,  he  was  in  the  end 
defeated  by  a coalition  of  the  supporters  of  the 
other  candidates.  He  published  The  Life  and  Let- 
ters of  John  Winthrop  (1867)  ; Washington , Bowdoin , 
and  Franklin  (1876),  and  Memoir  of  Henry  Clay 
(1880).  He  also  delivered  many  Speeches , Orations , 
and  Addresses  upon  political,  historical,  biograph- 
ical, and  literary  topics.  Notable  among  these 
are  an  address  upon  the  laying  of  the  corner-stone 
of  the  Washington  Monument  in  1840,  and  anoth- 
er upon  its  dedication  in  1885,  although  infirmity 
prevented  him  from  actually  delivering  the  latter. 

THE  MEMORY  OF  WASHINGTON. 

Of  merely  mortal  men  the  monument  we  have  dedi- 
cated to-day  points  out  the  one  for  all  Americans  to 
study,  to  imitate,  and,  as  far  as  may  be,  to  emulate. 

(366) 


ROBERT  CHARLES  WINTHROP 


367 


Keep  his  example  and  his  character  ever  before  your 
eyes  and  in  your  hearts.  Live  and  act  as  if  he  were 
seeing  and  judging  of  your  personal  conduct  and  your 
public  career.  Strive  to  approximate  that  lofty  stand- 
ard, and  measure  your  integrity  and  your  patriotism  by 
your  nearness  to  it,  or  your  departure  from  it.  The 
prime  meridian  of  universal  longitude,  on  sea  or  land, 
may  be  at  Greenwich,  or  at  Paris,  or  where  you  will ; 
but  the  prime  meridian  of  pure,  disinterested,  patriotic, 
exalted  human  character  will  be  marked  forever  by  yon- 
der Washington  Obelisk.  . . . 

The  inspiration  of  the  centennial  anniversary  of  the 
first  great  inauguration  must  not  be  lost  upon  us. 
Would  that  any  words  of  mine  could  help  us  all,  old 
and  young,  to  resolve  that  the  principles  and  character 
and  example  of  Washington,  as  he  came  forward  to  take 
the  oath  of  office  on  that  day,  shall  once  more  be  rec- 
ognized and  reverenced  as  the  model  for  all  who  suc- 
ceed him,  and  that  his  disinterested  purity  and  patriot- 
ism shall  be  the  supreme  test  and  standard  of  American 
statesmanship ! That  standard  can  never  be  taken 
from  us.  The  most  elaborate  and  durable  monuments 
may  perish,  but  neither  the  forces  of  nature,  nor  any 
fiendish  crime  of  man,  can  ever  mar  or  mutilate  a great 
example  of  public  or  private  virtue. 

Our  matchless  obelisk  stands  proudly  before  us  to- 
day, and  we  hail  it  with  the  exultation  of  a united  and 
glorious  nation.  It  may  or  may  not  be  proof  against 
the  cavils  of  critics,  but  nothing  of  human  construction 
is  against  the  casualties  of  time.  The  storms  of  winter 
must  blow  and  beat  upon  it.  The  action  of  the  ele- 
ments must  soil  and  discolor  it.  The  lightnings  of 
heaven  may  scar  and  blacken  it.  An  earthquake  may 
shake  its  foundations.  Some  mighty  tornado,  or  resist- 
less cyclone,  may  rend  its  massive  blocks  asunder,  and 
hurl  huge  blocks  to  the  ground.  But  the  character 
which  it  commemorates  is  secure.  It  will  remain  un- 
changed and  unchangeable  in  all  its  consummate  purity 
and  splendor,  and  will  more  and  more  command  the 
homage  of  succeeding  ages  in  all  regions  of  the  earth. 
God  be  praised,  that  character  is  ours  forever  ! — Dedi- 
cation of  the  Washington  Monument>  1885. 


WINTHROP,  Theodore,  an  American  nov- 
elist, born  at  New  Haven,  Conn.,  September  22, 
1828;  killed  in  battle  near  Big  Bethel,  Va.,  June 
10,  1861.  He  was  graduated  at  Yale  in  1848,  and 
remained  there  a year  longer,  when  he  went  to 
Europe  for  the  benefit  of  his  health.  While  abroad 
he  became  intimate  with  Mr.  W.  H.  Aspinwall, 
through  whom  he  entered  the  employment  of  the 
Pacific  Mail  Company,  and  was  variously  engaged 
on  the  Pacific  Coast  and  on  the  Isthmus  of  Darien, 
until  1854,  when  he  began  the  study  of  law  at 
New  York,  and  was  admitted  to  the  bar  in  1855. 
He,  however,  turned  his  thoughts  to  literature 
rather  than  to  law,  and  wrote  several  novels,  to 
which  exceptions  were  taken  by  the  proposed 
publishers.  The  objectionable  parts  were  elimi- 
nated, and  finally  two  of  them,  Cecil  Dreeme,  a 
novel  of  literary  and  social  life  in  New  York,  and 
John  Brent , a mining  story  of  California,  were  ac- 
cepted for  publication.  But  the  Civil  War  broke 
out,  and  men’s  thoughts  were  not  much  inclined 
toward  fiction.  So  the  novels  were  laid  aside  on 
the  publishers’  shelves ; and  Winthrop  himself 
volunteered  in  the  army.  His  military  career  was 
a brief  one.  At  the  “affair”  of  Big  Bethel,  Win- 
throp, then  ranking  as  major,  was  shot  down,  and 
died  upon  the  spot.  Not  long  before  this  he  had 

sent  to  the  Atlantic  Monthly  his  story  Love  and 

(^68j 


THEODORE  IVINTHROP 


369 


Skates,  which,  however,  did  not  appear  until  after 
his  death.  His  works  are  Cecil  Dreeme  (1861); 
John  Brent  (1862) ; The  Canoe  and  the  Saddle  (1862) ; 
Edwin  Brothertoft  (1862)  ; Life  in  the  Open  Air 
(1863).  A volume  containing  his  Life  and  Poems, 
edited  by  his  sister,  was  published  in  1884. 

Winthrop’s  style  is  vigorous  and,  when  neces- 
sary, picturesque.  Like  most  young  writers  of 
his  time,  he  felt  the  influence  of  Victor  Hugo,  and 
tried  to  turn  his  earlier  work  out  in  short  sen- 
tences, each  epigrammatic,  and  the  succession  of 
them  like  the  rattle  of  picket-skirmishing.  In  his 
Cecil  Dreeme  is  to  be  seen  this  tendency.  In  his 
later  works  he  abandoned  this  attempt  and  con- 
tented himself  with  simple,  nervous,  compact  “ An- 
glo-Saxon ” English.  His  John  Brent  is  a vivid 
story  of  California  mining  life  and  of  his  journey 
across  the  plains.  In  his  Edwin  Brothertoft  we 
have  a Colonial  historical  romance  which  com- 
pares most  favorably  with  those  so  popular  in 
these  days. 

THE  NEW  SUPERINTENDENT. 

Superintendent  Whiffler  came  over  to  see  his  suc- 
cessor. He  did  not  like  Wade’s  looks.  The  new  man 
should  have  looked  mean,  or  weak,  or  rascally,  to  suit 
the  outgoer. 

“ How  long  do  you  expect  to  stay  ?*’  asks  Whiffler. 

“ Until  the  men  and  I,  or  the  Company  and  I,  cannot 
pull  together.*’ 

“ I’ll  give  you  a week  to  quarrel  with  both,  and  an- 
other to  see  the  whole  concern  go  to  everlasting  smash.” 

At  ten  the  next  morning  Whiffler  handed  over  the 
safe-key  to  Wade,  and  departed.  Wade  walked  with 
him  to  the  gate. 

“I’m  glad  to  be  out  of  a sinking  ship,”  said  the  ex- 
poss.  “The  Works  will  go  down,  sure  as  shooting. 


370 


THEODORE  WINTHROP 


And  I think  myself  well  out  of  the  clutches  of  these 
men.  They’re  a bullying,  swearing,  drinking  set  of 
infernal  ruffians.  Foremen  are  just  as  bad  as  hands. 
I never  felt  safe  of  my  life  with  them.” 

“ A bad  lot,  are  they  ? ” mused  Wade,  as  he  returned 
to  the  office.  “ I must  give  them  a little  sharp  talk  by 
way  of  inaugural.” 

He  had  the  bell  tapped,  and  the  men  called  together 
in  the  main  building.  Much  work  was  still  going 
on  in  an  inefficient,  unsystematic  way.  Raw  material 
in  big  heaps  lay  about,  waiting  for  the  fire  to  ripen  it. 
There  was  a stack  of  long,  rough,  rusty  pigs,  clumsy  as 
the  shillelahs  of  the  Atiakim  ; there  was  a pile  of  short, 
thick  masses,  lying  higgedly-piggedly — stuff  from  the 
neighboring  mines,  which  needed  to  be  crossed  with 
foreign  stock  before  it  could  be  of  much  use  in  civiliza- 
tion. Here,  too,  was  raw  material  organized— members 
of  machines  only  asking  to  be  put  together,  and  vivi- 
fied by  steam,  and  they  would  go  at  their  work  with  a 
will. 

Wade  grew  indignant,  as  he  looked  about  him  and 
saw  so  much  good  stuff  and  good  force  wasted  for  want 
of  a little  will  and  skill  to  train  the  force  and  manage 
the  stuff.  “ All  they  want  here  is  a head,”  he  thought. 
He  shook  his  own.  The  brain  within  was  well  devel- 
oped with  healthy  exercise.  It  filled  its  case,  and  did 
not  rattle  like  a withered  kernel,  or  sound  soft  like  a 
rotten  one.  It  was  a vigorous,  muscular  brain.  The 
owner  felt  that  he  could  trust  it  for  an  effort,  as  he 
could  his  lungs  for  a shout,  his  legs  for  a leap,  or  his 
fist  for  a knock-down  argument. 

At  the  tap  of  the  bell,  the  “bad  lot”  of  men  came 
together.  They  numbered  more  than  two  hundred, 
though  the  foundery  was  working  short.  They  came  up 
with  an  easy  and  somewhat  swaggering  bearing — a 
good  many  roughs,  with  here  and  there  a ruffian.  Sev- 
eral, as  they  approached,  swung  and  tossed,  for  mere 
overplus  of  strength,  the  sledges  with  which  they  had 
been  tapping  at  the  bald,  shiny  pates  of  their  anvils. 
Several  wielded  their  long  pokers  like  lances. 

Grimy  chaps,  all  with  their  faces  streaked,  like  Black- 
feet  in  their  war-paint.  Their  hairy  chests  showed 


THEODORE  IV I NT  HR  OP 


37i 


where  some  men  parade  shirt-bosoms.  Some  had  rolled 
their  flannels  up  to  the  shoulder,  above  the  bulging 
muscles  of  the  upper  arm.  They  wore  aprons  tied 
about  the  neck,  like  the  bibs  of  our  childhood  ; or  about 
the  waist,  like  the  coquettish  articles  which  young 
housewives  affect.  But  there  was  no  coquetry  in  these 
great  flaps  of  leather  or  canvas,  and  they  were  be- 
smeared and  rust-stained  quite  beyond  any  bib  that 
ever  suffered  under  bread-and-molasses  or  mud-pie 
treatment.  . . . 

The  Hands  faced  the  Head.  It  was  a question 
whether  the  Two  Hundred  or  the  One  should  be  mas- 
ter in  Dunderbunk.  Which  was  boss  ? An  old  ques- 
tion. It  has  to  be  settled  whenever  a new  man  claims 
power ; and  there  is  always  a struggle  until  it  is  fought 
out  by  main  force  of  brain  or  muscle. 

Wade  had  made  up  his  mind  on  the  subject.  He  be- 
gan, short  and  sharp  as  a trip-hammer  when  it  has  a 
bar  to  shape  : 

“I’m  the  new  Superintendent.  Richard  Wade  is  my 
name.  I rang  the  bell  because  I wanted  to  see  you, 
and  have  you  see  me.  You  know  as  well  as  I do  that 
these  Works  are  in  a bad  way.  They  can’t  stay  so. 
They  must  come  up  and  pay  you  regular  wages,  and  the 
Company  profits.  Every  man  of  you  has  got  to  be  here 
on  the  spot  when  the  bell  strikes,  and  up  to  the  mark 
in  his  work.  You  haven’t  been — and  you  know  it. 
You’ve  turned  out  rotten  stuff — stuff  that  any  honest 
shop  would  be  ashamed  of.  Now  there’s  to  be  a new 
leaf  turned  over  here.  You’re  to  be  paid  on  the  nail; 
but  you’ve  got  to  earn  your  money.  I wonY  have  any 
idlers  or  shirkers  or  rebels  about  me.  I shall  work 
hard  myself ; and  every  man  of  you  will,  or  he  leaves 
the  shop.  Now,  if  anybody  has  any  complaint  to  make, 
I’ll  hear  him  before  you  all.” 

The  men  were  evidently  impressed  with  Wade’s  In- 
augural. It  meant  something.  But  they  were  not  to  be 
put  down  so  easily,  after  long  misrule.  There  began 
to  be  a whisper — 

“ B'il  in,  Bill  Tarbox  ! and  talk  to  him  ! ” 

Presently  Bill  shouldered  forward,  and  faced  the  new 
*uler.  Since  Bill  had  taken  to  drink  and  degradation,  he 
Vol.  XXIV—  34 


372 


THEODORE  WINTHROP 


had  been  the  butt-end  of  riot  and  revolt  at  the  foundery. 
He  had  had  his  own  way  with  Whiffler.  He  did  not 
like  to  abdicate,  and  give  in  to  this  new  chap  without 
testing  him.  . . . 

“ We  allow,”  says  Bill,  in  a tone  half-way  between  La- 
blache’s  De  profundis  and  a burglar’s  bull-dog’s  snarl, 
“ that  we’ve  did  our  work  as  good  as  need  to  be  did. 
We  ’xpect  we  know  our  rights.  We  haven’t  been  treated 
fair,  and  I’m  damned  if  we’re  go’n’  to  stan’  it.” 

“Stop!  ” says  Wade.  “No  swearing  in  this  shop  ! ” 

“ Who  the  devil  is  go’n’  to  stop  it  ? ” growled  Tarbox. 
“ I am.  Do  you  step  back  now,  and  let  someone 
come  forward  who  can  talk  like  a gentleman.” 

“ I’m  damned  if  I stir  till  I’ve  had  my  say  out,”  says 
Bill,  shaking  himself  up,  and  looking  dangerous. 

“ Go  back  ! ” Wade  moved  close  to  him,  also  looking 
dangerous. 

“Don’t  tech  me  ! ” Bill  threatened,  squaring  off. 

He  was  not  quick  enough.  Wade  knocked  him  down 
flat  on  a heap  of  moulding-sand.  The  hat  in  mourning 
for  Poole  found  its  place  in  a puddle. 

Bill  did  not  like  the  new  Emperor’s  mode  of  compel- 
ling Kotou . Round  One  of  the  mill  had  not  given  him 
enough.  He  jumped  up  from  his  soft  bed,  and  made 
a vicious  rush  at  Wade.  The  same  fist  met  him  again, 
and  heavier.  Up  went  his  heels  ; down  went  his  head. 
It  struck  the  ragged  edge  of  a fresh  casting,  and  there 
he  lay,  stunned  and  bleeding,  on  his  hard  black  pillow. 

“Ring  the  bell  to  go  to  work  ! ” said  Wade,  in  a tone 
that  made  the  ringer  jump.  “ Now,  men,  take  hold  and 
do  your  duty,  and  everything  will  go  smooth  ! ” 

The  bell  clanged  in.  The  line  looked  at  its  prostrate 
champion,  then  at  the  new  boss  standing  there,  cool  and 
brave,  and  not  afraid  of  a regiment  of  sledge-ham- 
mers. They  wanted  an  executive.  They  wanted  to  be 
well-governed — as  all  men  do.  The  new  man  looked 
like  a talked  fair,  and  hit  hard.  Why  not  all  hands 
give  in  with  a good  grace,  and  go  to  work  like  honest 
fellows?  The  line  broke  up.  The  hands  went  off  to 
their  duty.  And  there  was  never  any  more  insubordi- 
nation in  Dunderbunk. — Love  and  Skates . 


WIRT,  William,  an  American  lawyer,  patriot, 
and  orator,  born  at  Bladensburg,  Md.,  November 
8,  1772;  died  at  Washington,  D.  C.,  February  8, 
1834.  His  father  was  from  Switzerland,  his 
mother  a German.  He  was  educated  in  neighbor- 
ing classical  schools,  studied  law,  was  admitted  to 
the  bar  of  Virginia,  in  1792,  and  practised  in  sev- 
eral places,  finally  in  Richmond.  He  was  a mem- 
ber of  the  House  of  Delegates,  and  United  States 
Attorney  for  Virginia.  From  1817  to  1829  he  was 
United  States  Attorney-General.  In  1829  he  re- 
moved to  Baltimore,  and  in  1832  was  nominated 
for  President  of  the  United  States  by  the  Anti- 
Masons.  His  most  famous  speeches  are  those  as 
counsel  for  the  Government  against  Aaron  Burr. 
Fie  published  Letters  of  a British  Spy  (1803) — in 
the  character  of  a travelling  Englishman  ; The 
Rainbow , consisting  of  essays  from  the  Richmond 
Enquirer;  the  two  arguments  in  the  Burr  trial; 
a number  of  Addresses , and  The  Life  of  Patrick 
Henry  (1817).  He  was  co-author  with  George 
Tucker  and  others  of  a series  of  essays  published 
collectively  in  1812  under  the  title,  The  Old  Bach - 
elor. 

“ Of  his  literary  merits,”  says  R.  W.  Griswold, 
44 1 do  not  think  highly.  His  abilities  were  more 
brilliant  than  solid.  He  had  a rapid  but  not  skil- 
ful command  of  language,  a prolific  but  not  a 


374 


WILLIAM  WIRT 


chaste  or  correct  fancy,  and  his  opinions  were 
generally  neither  new  nor  striking.’* 

Of  his  volume  on  Patrick  Henry,  Daniel  Web- 
ster reports  Thomas  Jefferson  as  saying:  “ It  is  a 
poor  book,  written  in  bad  taste,  and  gives  so  im- 
perfect an  idea  of  Patrick  Henry  that  it  seems  in- 
tended to  show  off  the  writer  more  than  the  sub- 
ject of  the  work.” 

BURR  AND  BLENNERHASSET. 

The  conduct  of  Aaron  Burr  has  been  considered 
in  relation  to  the  overt  act  on  Blennerhasset’s  Island 
only  ; whereas  it  ought  to  be  considered  in  connection 
with  the  grand  design  ; the  deep  plot  of  seizing  Orleans, 
separating  the  Union,  and  establishing  an  independent 
empire  in  the  West,  of  which  the  prisoner  was  to  be 
the  chief.  It  ought  to  be  recollected  that  these  were 
his  objects,  and  that  the  whole  Western  country,  from 
Beaver  to  Orleans,  was  the  theatre  of  his  treasonable 
operations.  It  is  by  this  first  reasoning  that  you  are  to 
consider  whether  he  be  a principal  or  an  accessory,  and 
not  by  limiting  your  inquiries  to  the  circumscribed  and 
narrow  spot  in  the  island  where  the  acts  charged  hap- 
pened to  be  performed.  Having  shown,  I think,  on  the 
ground  of  law,  that  the  prisoner  cannot  be  considered  as 
an  accessory,  let  me  press  the  inquiry  whether,  on  the 
ground  of  reason , he  be  a principal  or  an  accessory  : and 
remember  that  his  project  was  to  seize  New  Orleans, 
separate  the  Union,  and  erect  an  independent  empire 
in  the  West,  of  which  he  was  to  be  the  chief.  This  was 
the  destination  of  the  plot  and  the  conclusion  of  the 
drama.  Will  any  man  say  that  Blennerhasset  was  the 
principal,  and  Burr  but  an  accessory  ? Who  will  believe 
that  Burr,  the  author  and  projector  of  the  plot,  who 
raised  the  forces,  who  enlisted  the  men,  and  who  pro- 
cured the  funds  for  carrying  it  into  execution,  was  made 
a cat's-paw  of  ? Will  any  man  believe  that  Burr,  who  is 
a soldier,  bold,  ardent,  restless,  and  aspiring,  the  great 
actor  whose  brain  conceived  and  whose  hand  brought 


WILLIAM  WIRT 


375 


the  plot  into  operation,  that  he  should  sink  down  into 
an  accessory,  and  that  Blennerhasset  should  be  elevated 
into  a principal  ? He  would  startle  at  once  at  the 
thought.  Aaron  Burr,  the  contriver  of  the  whole  con- 
spiracy, to  everybody  concerned  in  it,  was  as  the  sun  to 
the  planets  which  surrounded  him.  Did  he  not  bind 
them  in  their  respective  orbits,  and  give  them  their 
light,  their  heat,  and  their  motion  ? Yet  he  is  to  be  con- 
sidered an  accessory,  and  Blennerhasset  is  to  be  the 
principal ! 

Who  Aaron  Burr  is  we  have  seen  in  part,  already. 
I will  add  that,  beginning  his  operations  in  New  York, 
he  associates  with  him  men  whose  wealth  is  to  supply 
the  necessary  funds.  Possessed  of  the  mainspring,  his 
personal  labor  contrives  all  the  machinery.  Pervading 
the  continent  from  New  York  to  New  Orleans,  he 
draws  into  his  plan,  by  every  allurement  which  he  can 
contrive,  men  of  all  ranks  and  descriptions.  To  youth- 
ful ardor  he  presents  danger  and  glory  ; to  ambition, 
rank  and  titles  and  honors  ; to  avarice,  the  mines  of 
Mexico.  To  each  person  whom  he  addresses  he  pre- 
sents the  object  adapted  to  his  taste.  His  recruiting 
officers  are  appointed.  Men  are  engaged  throughout 
the  continent.  Civil  life  is,  indeed,  quiet  upon  its  sur- 
face, but  in  its  bosom  this  man  has  contrived  to  deposit 
the  materials  which,  with  the  slightest  touch  of  his 
match,  produce  an  explosion  to  shake  the  continent. 
All  this  his  restless  ambition  has  contrived  ; and  in  the 
autumn  of  1806,  he  goes  forth,  for  the  last  time,  to 
apply  this  match.  On  this  occasion  he  meets  with 
Blennerhasset. 

Who  is  Blennerhasset  ? A native  of  Ireland  ; a man 
of  letters,  who  fled  from  the  storms  of  his  own  country 
to  find  quiet  in  ours.  His  history  shows  that  war  is 
not  the  natural  element  of  his  mind.  If  it  had  been,  he 
never  would  have  exchanged  Ireland  for  America.  So 
far  is  an  army  from  furnishing  the  society  natural  and 
proper  to  Mr.  Blennerhasset’s  character,  that  on  his  ar- 
rival in  America,  he  retired  even  from  the  population 
of  the  Atlantic  States,  and  sought  quiet  and  solitude  in 
the  bosom  of  our  Western  forests.  But  he  carried  with 
him  taste  and  science  and  wealth  ; and  lo,  the  desert 


376 


WILLIAM  WIRT 


smiled  ! Possessing  himself  of  a beautiful  island  in  the 
Ohio,  he  rears  upon  it  a palace,  and  decorates  it  with 
every  romantic  embellishment  of  fancy.  A shrubbery, 
that  Shenstone  might  have  envied,  blooms  around  him. 
Music,  that  might  have  charmed  Calypso  and  her 
nymphs,  is  his.  An  extensive  library  spreads  its  treas- 
ures before  him.  A philosophical  apparatus  offers  to 
him  all  the  secrets  and  mysteries  of  nature.  Peace, 
tranquillity  and  innocence  shed  their  mingled  delights 
around  him.  And  to  crown  the  enchantment  of  the 
scene,  a wife,  who  is  said  to  be  lovely  even  beyond  her 
sex,  and  graced  with  every  accomplishment  that  can 
render  it  irresistible,  had  blessed  him  with  her  love  and 
made  him  the  father  of  several  children.  The  evidence 
would  convince  you  that  this  is  but  a faint  picture  of 
the  real  life.  In  the  midst  of  all  this  peace,  this  inno- 
cent simplicity  and  this  tranquillity,  this  feast  of  the 
mind,  this  pure  banquet  of  the  heart,  the  destroyer 
comes  ; he  comes  to  change  this  paradise  into  a 
hell.  A stranger  presents  himself.  Introduced  to 
their  civilities  by  the  high  rank  which  he  had  lately 
held  in  his  country,  he  soon  finds  his  way  to  their 
hearts  by  the  dignity  and  elegance  of  his  demeanor,  the 
light  and  beauty  of  his  conversation,  and  the  seductive 
and  fascinating  power  of  his  address.  The  conquest 
is  not  difficult.  Innocence  is  ever  simple  and  cred- 
ulous. Conscious  of  no  design  itself,  it  suspects  none 
in  others.  It  wears  no  guard  before  its  breast.  Every 
door  and  portal  and  avenue  of  the  heart  is  thrown  open, 
and  all  who  choose  it  enter.  Such  was  the  state  of 
Eden  when  the  serpent  entered  its  bowers.  The  pris- 
oner, in  a more  engaging  form,  winding  himself  into 
the  open  and  unpractised  heart  of  the  unfortunate  Blen- 
nerhasset,  found  but  little  difficulty  in  changing  the 
native  character  of  that  heart  and  the  objects  of  its  af- 
fection. By  degrees  he  infuses  into  it  the  poison  of  his 
own  ambition.  He  breathes  into  it  the  fire  of  his  own 
courage  ; a daring  and  desperate  thirst  for  glory  ; an 
ardor  panting  for  great  enterprises,  for  all  the  storm 
and  bustle  and  hurricane  of  life.  In  a short  time  the 
whole  man  is  changed,  and  every  object  of  his  former 
delight  is  relinquished.  No  more  he  enjoys  the 


WILLIAM  WIRT 


377 


quil  scene  ; it  has  become  flat  and  insipid  to  his  taste. 
H is  books  are  abandoned.  His  retort  and  crucible  are 
thrown  aside.  His  shrubbery  blooms  and  breathes  its 
fragrance  upon  the  air  in  vain  ; he  likes  it  not.  His 
ear  no  longer  drinks  the  rich  melody  of  music  ; it  longs 
for  the  trumpet’s  clangor  and  the  cannon’s  roar.  Even 
the  prattle  of  his  babes,  once  so  sweet,  no  longer  affects 
him  ; and  the  angel  smile  of  his  wife,  which  hitherto 
touched  his  bosom  with  ecstasy  so  unspeakable,  is  now 
unseen  and  unfelt.  Greater  objects  have  taken  pos- 
session of  his  soul.  His  imagination  has  been  dazzled 
by  visions  of  diadems,  of  stars  and  garters  and  titles  of 
nobility.  He  has  been  taught  to  burn  with  restless 
emulation  at  the  names  of  great  heroes  and  conquerors. 
His  enchanted  island  is  destined  soon  to  relapse  into  a 
wilderness  ; and  in  a few  months  we  find  the  beautiful 
and  tender  partner  of  his  bosom,  whom  he  lately  “per- 
mitted not  the  winds  of  ” summer  “to  visit  too  rough- 
ly,” we  find  her  shivering  at  midnight,  on  the  wintry 
banks  of  the  Ohio,  and  mingling  her  tears  with  the  tor- 
rents, that  froze  as  they  fell.  Yet  this  unfortunate 
man,  thus  deluded  from  his  interest  and  his  happiness, 
thus  seduced  from  the  paths  of  innocence  and  peace, 
thus  confounded  in  the  toils  that  were  deliberately 
spread  for  him,  and  overwhelmed  by  the  mastering 
spirit  and  genius  of  another — this  man,  thus  ruined  and 
undone,  and  made  to  play  a subordinate  part  in  this 
grand  drama  of  guilt  and  treason,  this  man  is  to  be 
called  the  principal  offender,  while  he  by  whom  he  was 
thus  plunged  in  misery  is  comparatively  innocent,  a 
mere  accessory  ! Is  this  reason  ? Is  it  humanity  ? 
Sir,  neither  the  human  heart  nor  the  human  under- 
standing will  bear  a perversion  so  monstrous  and  ab- 
surd ! so  shocking  to  the  soul  ! so  revolting  to  reason  ! 
Let  Aaron  Burr,  then,  not  shrink  from  the  high  destina- 
tion which  he  has  courted  ; and,  having  already  ruined 
Blennerhasset  in  fortune,  character,  and  happiness  for- 
ever, let  him  not  attempt  to  finish  the  tragedy  by 
thrusting  that  ill-fated  man  between  himself  and  pun- 
ishment.—-Speech  in  Kennedy's  Memoirs  of  Wirt. 


WISEMAN,  Nicholas,  an  English  Roman 
Catholic  prelate  and  religious  writer,  born  at  Se- 
ville, Spain,  in  1802  ; died  at  London  in  1865.  His 
early  education  was  received  in  England,  but  at 
sixteen  he  entered  the  English  College  at  Rome ; 
was  ordained  to  the  priesthood  in  1825,  and  was 
made  professor  of  Oriental  languages  in  the  uni- 
versity, and  was  also  rector  of  the  English  Col- 
lege at  Rome  until  1835,  when  he  returned  to 
England,  where  he  became  noted  as  a preacher 
and  lecturer.  In  1840  he  was  created  by  the  Pope 
a bishop  in  partibus.  In  1849  he  was  made  Vicar 
Apostolic  of  the  London  district;  and  in  1850 
Roman  Catholic  Archbishop  of  Westminster  and 
a cardinal.  His  principal  works  are  Lectures  on 
the  Connection  between  Science  and  Revealed  Religion 
(1836);  The  Real  Presence  (1837);  Lectures  on  the 
Offices  and  Ceremoyiies  of  Holy  Week  (1839)  » Lectures 
on  the  Catholic  Hierarchy  (1850);  Fabiola , a Tale  of 
the  Catacombs  (1855) ; Recollections  of  the  Last  Four 
Popes  (1858);  Sermons  on  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ  and 
His  Blessed  Mother  (1864).  Besides  these  there 
are  several  volumes  of  miscellaneous  essays  and 
sermons,  and  a volume  of  Daily  Meditations , pub- 
lished after  his  death. 

A CHRISTIAN  HOME  IN  ROME. 

It  is  in  the  afternoon  in  September,  in  the  year  302, 
that  we  invite  our  readers  to  accompany  us  through  the 

(37SJ 


NICHOLAS  WISEMAN 


379 


Streets  of  Rome.  The  sun  has  declined,  and  is  about 
two  hours  from  his  setting  ; the  day  is  cloudless,  and 
its  heat  has  cooled,  so  that  multitudes  are  issuing  from 
their  houses  and  making  their  way  toward  Caesar’s 
gardens  on  one  side,  or  Sallust’s  on  the  other,  to 
enjoy  their  evening  walk,  and  learn  the  news  of  the 
day.  . . . 

The  house  to  which  we  invite  our  reader  is  on  the 
east  side  of  the  Septa  Julia,  in  the  Campus  Martius. 
From  the  outside  it  presents  but  a dead  and  black  ap- 
pearance. The  walls  are  plain,  without  architectural 
ornament ; not  high,  and  scarcely  broken  by  windows.  In 
the  middle  of  one  side  of  the  quadrangle  is  a door — in 
atrio,  that  is,  merely  revealed  by  a tympanum  or  triangular 
cornice,  resting  on  two  half-columns.  Using  our  priv- 
ilege, as  “artists  of  fiction,”  of  universal  ubiquity,  we 
will  enter  in  with  our  friend,  or  “ shadow,”  as  he  would 
anciently  have  been  called.  Passing  through  the  porch, 
on  the  pavement  of  which  we  read  with  pleasure,  in 
mosaic,  the  greeting,  Salve ! or  “Welcome!”  we  find 
ourselves  in  the  atrium,  or  first  court  of  the  house,  sur- 
rounded by  a portico  and  colonnade. 

In  the  centre  of  the  marble  pavement  a softly  war- 
bling jet  of  pure  water,  brought  by  the  Claudian  aque- 
duct from  the  Tusculan  hills,  springs  into  the  air — now 
higher,  now  lower — and  falls  into  an  elevated  basin  of 
red  marble,  over  the  rim  of  which  it  flows  in  downy 
waves ; and  before  reaching  its  lower  and  wider  recip- 
ient scatters  a gentle  shower  on  the  rare  and  brilliant 
flowers  placed  in  elegant  vases  around.  Under  the 
portico  we  see  furniture  disposed,  of  a rich  and  some- 
times rare  character  : couches  inlaid  with  ivory,  and 
even  silver  ; tables  of  Oriental  woods,  bearing  candela- 
bra, lamps,  and  other  household  implements  of  bronze 
and  silver ; delicately  chased  busts,  vases,  tripods,  and 
objects  of  mere  art.  On  the  walls  are  paintings — evi- 
dently of  a former  period — still,  however,  retaining  all 
their  brightness  of  color  and  richness  of  execution. 
These  are  separated  by  niches,  with  statues  represent- 
ing, indeed,  like  the  pictures,  mythological  or  historical 
subjects  ; but  we  cannot  help  observing  that  nothing 
meets  the  eye  which  could  offend  even  the  most  delicate 


3&> 


NICHOLAS  WISEMAN 


mind.  Here  and  there  are  empty  niches  or  a covered 
painting,  proving  that  this  is  not  the  result  of  accident. 

Outside  the  columns,  the  covering  roof  leaves  a large 
square  in  the  centre,  called  the  impluviam ; there  is 
drawn  across  it  a curtain,  or  veil,  of  dark  canvas,  which 
keeps  out  the  sun  and  rain.  An  artificial  twilight  there- 
fore alone  enables  us  to  see  all  that  has  been  described; 
but  it  gives  greater  effect  to  what  is  beyond.  Through 
an  arch  opposite  to  the  one  whereby  we  have  entered, 
we  catch  a glimpse  of  an  inner  and  still  richer  court, 
paved  with  variegated  marbles,  and  adorned  with  bright 
gilding.  The  veil  of  the  opening  above,  which,  how- 
ever, here  is  covered  with  thick  glass  or  talc  (lapis  spe - 
cularis ),  has  been  partly  withdrawn,  and  admits  a bright 
but  softened  ray  from  the  evening  sun  on  to  the  place 
where  we  see  for  the  first  time  that  we  are  in  no  en- 
chanted hall,  but  in  an  inhabited  house. — Fabiola. 


WOLCOT,  John,  an  English  physician  and 
satirist,  known  under  his  pseudonym  “ Peter  Pin- 
dar,” born  near  Kingsbridge,  in  Devonshire,  in 
May,  1738;  died  in  London,  January  14,  1819. 
Having  studied  medicine,  and  “ walked  the  hos- 
pitals” in  London,  he  was  invited  by  Sir  William 
Trelawney,  the  newly  appointed  Governor  of  Ja- 
maica, to  accompany  him  as  his  medical  attendant. 
A church  living  having  become  vacant,  it  was 
bestowed  upon  the  convivial  and  sport-loving 
doctor,  who  had  obtained  ordination  from  the 
Bishop  of  London.  His  patron  died,  and  Wolcot 
threw  up  the  clerical  profession,  returned  to  Eng- 
land, and  set  up  as  a physician  at  Truro,  where 
he  gained  local  celebrity  as  a wit.  About  1780 
he  went  to  London,  where  he  entered  upon  his 
literary  career  as  a satirist,  lasting  fully  forty  years. 
Such  was  their  popularity  that  in  1795  an  edition 
of  his  poems  in  four  volumes  was  published,  the 
booksellers  engaging  to  pay  him  £2  50  a year  for 
the  copyright,  as  long  as  he  lived.  To  their 
great  loss  he  lived  to  draw  his  annuity  for  a quar- 
ter of  a century.  Some  of  Wolcot’s  poems  are 
satires  of  the  keenest  kind,  but  most  of  them  are 
clever  squibs  and  lampoons,  aimed  at  literati, 
scientists,  academicians,  courtiers,  and  especially 
at  King  George  III.,  whose  personal  character- 
istics—real  or  alleged— -afforded  an  inexhaustible 
(381} 


382 


JOHN  WO  LOOT 


theme  for  caricature.  In  the  end  he  received  a 
pension  from  the  Government;  the  price,  it  is 
said,  of  his  ceasing  to  lampoon  the  King  and  his 
Ministers. 


THE  PILGRIMS  AND  THE  PEAS. 

A brace  of  sinners,  for  no  good, 

Were  ordered  to  the  Virgin  Mary’s  shrine, 

Who  at  Loretto  dwelt — in  wax,  stone,  wood, 

And  in  a curled  white  wig  looked  wondrous  fine. 

Fifty  long  miles  had  these  sad  rogues  to  travel, 

With  something  in  their  shoes  much  worse  than  gravel 
In  short,  their  toes  so  gentle  to  amuse, 

The  priest  had  ordered  peas  into  their  shoes — 

A nostrum  famous  in  old  popish  times 
For  purifying  souls  that  stunk  with  crimes ; 

A sort  of  apostolic  salt, 

That  popish  parsons  for  its  powers  exalt, 

For  keeping  souls  of  sinners  sweet, 

Just  as  our  kitchen-salt  keeps  meat. 

The  knaves  set  off  on  the  same  day— 

Peas  in  their  shoes— to  go  and  pray  ; 

But  very  different  was  their  speed,  I wot : 

One  of  the  sinners  galloped  on, 

Light  as  a bullet  from  a gun  ; 

The  other  limped  as  if  he  had  been  shot. 

One  saw  the  Virgin  soon,  Peccavi  cried, 

Had  his  soul  whitewashed  all  so  clever, 

When  home  again  he  quickly  hied, 

Made  fit  with  saints  above  to  live  forever. 

In  coming  back,  however,  let  me  say, 

He  met  his  brother-rogue,  about  half-way, 

Hobbling  with  outstretched  hams  and  bended  knees. 
Cursing  the  souls  and  bodies  of  the  peas. 

His  eyes  in  tears,  his  cheeks  and  brow  in  sweat. 

Deep  sympathizing  with  his  groaning  feet. 


JOILV  WOLCOT  3S3 

“How  now!”  the  light-toed,  whitewashed  pilgrim 
broke, 

“ You  lazy  lubber ! ” — 

:i  Confound  it  !”  cried  the  other,  " 'tis  no  joke ; 

My  feet,  once  hard  as  any  rock, 

Are  now  as  soft  as  blubber 
(Excuse  me,  Virgin  Mary,  that  I swear). 

As  for  Loretto,  I shall  not  get  there. 

No ! to  the  Devil  my  sinful  soul  must  go, 

For  hang  me  if  I ha’n’t  lost  every  toe  ! 

But,  brother-sinner,  do  explain 
How  ’tis  that  you  are  not  in  pain  ; 

What  power  hath  worked  a wonder  for  your  toes ; 
Whilst  I,  just  like  a snail  am  crawling, 

Now  swearing,  now  on  saints  devoutly  bawling, 

While  not  a rascal  comes  to  ease  my  woes  ? 

How  is’t  that  you  can  like  a greyhound  go, 

Merry  as  if  naught  had  happened,  burn  ye  ! ” 

“ Why,”  cried  the  other,  grinning,  “you  must  know 
That  just  before  I ventured  on  my  journey, 

To  walk  a little  more  at  ease, 

I took  the  liberty  to  boil  my  peas.” 


WOLFE,  Charles,  a British  poet,  born  in 
Dublin,  December  14,  1791  ; died  at  Cork,  Febru- 
ary 21,  182?,  He  was  graduated  at  Trinity  Col- 
lege, Dublin,  in  1814,  was  tutor  there,  and,  taking 
orders  in  1817,  became  curate  at  Bally  clog,  and 
subsequently  at  Donoughmore.  He  wrote  an  ode 
on  the  death  of  Sir  John  Moore,  which  has  be- 
come celebrated.  His  Remains , with  a Memoir, 
were  published  by  Archbishop  John  Russell 
(1825). 

“ In  the  lottery  of  literature,’*  says  D.  M.  Moir, 
“ Charles  Wolfe  has  been  one  of  the  few  who  have 
drawn  the  prize  of  probable  immortality  from  a 
casual  gleam  of  inspiration  thrown  over  a single 
poem  consisting  of  only  a few  stanzas  ; and  these, 
too,  little  more  than  a spirited  version  from  the 
poem  of  another.  But  the  Ode  on  the  Burial  of  Sir 
John  Moore  is  indeed  full  of  fervor  and  freshness, 
and  the  writer’s  triumph  is  not  to  be  grudged. 
The  lines 

If  I had  thought  thou  couldst  have  died 
I might  not  weep  for  thee, 

in  elegance  and  tender  earnestness  are  worthy 
of  either  Campbell  or  Byron.  The  lyric  went 
directly  to  the  heart  of  the  nation,  and  it  is  likely 

to  remain  forever  enshrined  there.” 

(334) 


CHARLES  WOLFE 


385 


THE  BURIAL  OF  SIR  JOHN  MOORE. 

Not  a drum  was  heard,  not  a funeral  note, 

As  his  corse  to  the  rampart  we  hurried  ; 

Not  a soldier  discharged  his  farewell  shot 
O’er  the  grave  where  our  hero  was  buried. 

We  buried  him  darkly  at  dead  of  night. 

The  sods  with  our  bayonets  turning  ; 

By  the  struggling  moonbeams’  misty  ligha. 

And  the  lantern  dimly  burning. 

No  useless  coffin  enclosed  his  breast, 

Nor  in  sheet  or  in  shroud  we  wound  him  ; 

But  he  lay  like  a warrior  taking  his  rest. 

With  his  martial  cloak  around  him. 

Few  and  short  were  the  prayers  we  said, 

And  we  spoke  not  a word  of  sorrow ; 

But  we  steadfastly  gazed  on  the  face  of  the  dead 
And  we  bitterly  thought  of  the  morrow. 

We  thought,  as  we  hollowed  his  narrow  bed 
And  smoothed  down  his  lonely  pillow, 

That  the  foe  and  the  stranger  would  tread  o’er  his  head 
And  we  far  away  on  the  billow. 

Lightly  they’ll  talk  of  the  spirit  that’s  gone, 

And  o’er  his  cold  ashes  upbraid  him— 

But  little  he’ll  reck,  if  they  let  him  sleep  on 
In  the  grave  where  a Briton  has  laid  him. 

But  half  our  heavy  task  was  done 

When  the  clock  struck  the  hour  for  retiring  5 

And  we  heard  the  distant  and  random  gun 
That  the  foe  was  sullenly  firing. 

Slowly  and  sadly  we  laid  him  down, 

From  the  field  of  his  fame  fresh  and  gory ; 

We  carved  not  a line,  we  raised  not  a stone— 

But  we  left  him  alone  in  his  glory. 


WOOD,  Ellen  (Price),  an  English  novelist, 
known  to  the  fiction-reading  public  as  Mrs.  Henry 
Wood,  born  in  Worcestershire,  January  17,  1814; 
died  February  10,  1887.  She  began  to  write  at  an 
early  age,  but  her  first  novel,  Danesbury  House , was 
not  published  until  i860.  It  gained  the  prize  of- 
fered by  the  Scottish  Temperance  League  for  the 
best  story  illustrating  the  good  effects  of  temper- 
ance. In  1867  Mrs.  Wood  became  the  editor  of  the 
Argosy , a monthly  magazine  published  in  Lon- 
don. Among  her  numerous  novels  are  East  Lynne 
(1861);  The  Channings  (1862);  Mrs . Halliburton  s 
Troubles  (1862) ; The  Shadow  of  Ashlydy at  (1863); 
Verners  Pride  (1863 ) ; Oswald  Cray  (1864)  ; Trevlyn 
Hold , or  Squire  Trevlyn  s Heir  (1864);  Mildred  Ar - 
kell  (1865);  Elsters  Folly  (1866) ; St.  Martin's  Eve 
(1866);  A Life  Secret  (1867);  The  Red  Court  Farm 
(1868) ; Anne  Hereford  (1868) ; Roland  Yorke  (1869) ; 
Bessy  Rane  (1870) ; George  Canterbury  s Will  (1870) ; 
Dene  Hollow  (1871);  Within  the  Maze  (1872);  The 
Master  of  Grey  lands  (1873)  ; fohnny  Ludlow  (1874- 
80);  Told  in  the  Twilight  (1875);  Bessy  Wells  (1875); 
Our  Children  (1876)  ; Edina  (1876) ; Pomeroy  Abbey 
(1878);  Court  Nether leigh  (1881);  Helen  Whitneys 
Wedding  (1885). 

“ Mrs.  Henry  Wood,”  says  the  Saturday  Revtewy 
“ has  certain  qualities  which  should  have  made 
her  one  of  our  best  novel-writers ; popular  is  an- 


ELLEN  WOOD 


387 


other  word.  No  one  lays  out  the  plan  of  a story 
better  than  she  does,  and  even  Mr.  Wilkie  Col- 
lins himself,  to  whom  ingenuity  is  the  alpha 
and  omega  of  his  craft,  is  not  greater  than  she 
is  in  the  cleverness  with  which  she  devises  her 
puzzles  and  fits  the  parts  together.  But  Mrs. 
Wood  loses  herself  in  certain  besetting  sins,  which 
are  apparently  beyond  her  power  to  overcome. 
She  is  puerile,  commonplace,  and  ineradicably 
vulgar.  . . . We  do  not  find  in  her  books  a 

trace  of  that  professional  pride  and  thoroughness 
which  desires  to  make  a thing  good  all  through, 
without  reference  to  publishers  or  profit.” 

A STARTLING  DISCOVERY. 

Charlotte  Guise  opened  the  door  and  stood  to  listen. 
Not  a sound  save  the  ticking  of  the  clock  broke  the 
stillness.  She  was  quite  alone.  Flora  was  fast  asleep 
in  her  room  in  the  front  corridor,  next  to  Mrs.  Castle- 
maine’s  chamber,  for  she  had  been  in  to  see,  and  she 
had  taken  the  precaution  of  turning  the  key  on  the 
child  for  safety.  Yet  another  minute  she  stood  listen- 
ing, candle  in  hand.  Then,  swiftly  crossing  the  pas- 
sage, she  stole  into  the  study  through  the  double-doors. 

The  same  orderly,  unlittered  room  that  she  had  seen 
before.  No  papers  lay  about,  no  deeds  were  left  out 
that  could  be  of  use  to  her.  Three  books  were  stacked 
upon  the  side-table  ; a newspaper  lay  on  a chair  ; and 
that  was  positively  all.  The  fire  had  long  ago  gone 
out ; on  the  mantelpiece  was  a box  of  matches. 

Putting  down  the  candle,  Charlotte  Guise  took  out 
her  key,  and  tried  the  bureau.  It  opened  at  once. 
She  swung  back  the  heavy  lid  and  waited  a moment  to 
recover  herself ; her  lips  were  white,  her  breath  came 
in  gasps.  Oh,  apart  from  the  baseness,  the  dishonor  of 
the  act,  which  was  very  present  to  her  mind,  what  if 
she  were  to  be  caught  at  it  ? Papers  there  were  en 
masse.  The  drawers  and  pigeon-holes  seemed  to  be 
You  XXIV.— a* 


388 


ELLEN  WOOD 


full  of  them.  So  far  as  she  could  judge  from  a short 
examination — and  she  did  not  dare  to  give  a long  one 
— these  papers  had  reference  to  business  transactions, 
to  sales  of  goods  and  commercial  matters — which  she 
rather  wondered  at,  but  did  not  understand.  But  of 
deeds  she  could  see  none. 

What  did  Charlotte  Guise  expect  to  find  ? What  did 
she  promise  herself  by  this  secret  search  ? In  truth, 
she  could  not  have  told.  She  wanted  to  get  some  rec- 
ord of  her  husband’s  fate,  some  proof  that  should  com- 
promise the  master  of  Greylands.  She  would  also  have 
been  glad  to  find  some  will,  or  deed  of  gift,  that  should 
show  to  her  how  Greylands  Rest  had  been  really  left 
by  old  Anthony  Castlemaine  ; whether  to  his  son  Basil 
or  to  James.  If  to  Basil,  why,  there  would  be  a proof — 
as  she,  poor  thing,  deemed  it — of  the  manner  in  which 
James  Castlemaine  had  dealt  with  his  nephew,  and  its 
urging  motive. 

No  ; there  was  nothing.  Opening  this  bundle  of  pa- 
pers, rapidly  glancing  into  that,  turning  over  the  other, 
she  could  find  absolutely  nothing  ; and  in  the  revulsion 
of  feeling  the  disappointment  caused,  she  said  to  her- 
self how  worse  than  foolish  she  had  been  to  expect  to 
find  anything  ; how  utterly  devoid  of  reason  she  must 
be,  to  suppose  Mr.  Castlemaine  would  preserve  memen- 
toes of  an  affair  so  dangerous.  And  where  he  kept  his 
law-papers  or  parchments  relating  to  his  estate  she 
could  not  tell,  but  certainly  they  were  not  in  the  bureau. 

Not  daring  to  stay  longer,  for  near  upon  half  an  hour 
must  have  elapsed,  she  replaced  the  things  as  she  had 
found  them,  so  far  as  she  could  remember.  All  was 
done  save  one  drawer — a small  drawer  at  the  foot,  next 
the  slab.  It  had  but  a few  receipted  bills  in  it  ; there 
was  one  from  a saddler,  one  from  a coach-maker,  and 
such-like.  The  drawer  was  very  shallow,  and,  in  closing 
it,  the  bills  were  forced  out  again.  Charlotte  Guise,  in 
her  trepidation  and  hurry,  pulled  the  drawer  forward 
too  forcibly,  and  pulled  it  out  of  its  frame. 

Had  it  chanced  by  accident — this  little  contretemps? 
Ah,  no.  When  do  these  strange  trifles,  pregnant  with 
events  of  moment,  occur  by  chance  ? At  the  top  of  the 
drawer  appeared  a narrow,  close  compartment,  opening 


EL  LENT  WOOD 


3R9 


with  a slide.  Charlotte  drew  the  slide  back,  and  saw 
within  it  a folded  letter  and  some  small  articles  wrapped 
in  paper. 

The  letter,  which  she  opened  and  read,  proved  to  be 
the  one  written  by  Basil  Castlemaine  on  his  death-bed 
— the  same  letter  that  had  been  brought  over  by  young 
Anthony,  and  given  to  his  uncle.  There  was  nothing 
much  to  note  in  it — save  that  Basil  assumed  throughout 
it  that  the  estate  was  his,  and  would  be  his  son’s  after 
him.  Folding  it  again,  she  opened  the  bit  of  paper,  and 
there  shone  out  a diamond  ring  that  flashed  in  the  can- 
dle’s rays. 

Charlotte  Guise  took  it  up  and  let  it  fall  again — let 
it  fall  in  a kind  of  sick  horror,  and  staggered  to  a chair 
and  sat  down,  half-fainting.  For  it  was  her  husband’s 
ring ; the  ring  that  Anthony  had  worn  always  on  his 
left-hand  little  finger  ; the  ring  that  he  had  on  when  he 
quitted  Gap.  It  was  the  same  ring  that  John  Bent  and 
his  wife  had  often  noticed  and  admired  ; the  ring  that 
was  undoubtedly  on  his  hand,  when  he  followed  Mr. 
Castlemaine  that  ill-fated  night  into  the  Friar^s  Keep. 
His  poor  wife  recognized  it  instantly  ; she  knew  it  by  its 
peculiar  setting.  . . . 

When  somewhat  recovered  she  kissed  the  ring,  and 
put  it  back  into  the  small  compartment  with  the  letter. 
Pushing  in  the  slide,  she  shut  the  drawer  and  closed 
and  locked  the  bureau  ; thus  leaving  all  things  as  she 
had  found  them.  Not  very  much  result  had  been  gained 
it  is  true,  but  enough  to  spur  her  onward  on  her  future 
search.  With  her  mind  in  a chaos  of  tumult,  with  her 
brain  in  a whirl  of  pain,  with  every  vein  throbbing 
and  fevered,  she  left  the  candle  on  the  ground  where 
she  had  lodged  it,  and  went  to  the  window,  gasping  for 
air. 

The  night  was  bright  with  stars  ; opposite  to  her, 
and  seemingly  at  no  distance  at  all,  rose  that  dark  build- 
ing, the  Friar’s  Keep.  As  she  stood  with  her  eyes 
strained  upon  it,  though  in  reality  not  seeing  it  but 
deep  in  inward  thought,  there  suddenly  shone  a faint 
light  at  one  of  the  casements.  Her  attention  was 
awakened  now  ; her  heart  began  to  throb. 

The  faint  light  grew  brighter;  and  she  distinctly 


390 


ELLEN  WOOD 


saw  a form  in  a monk's  habit,  the  cowl  drawn  over  his 
head,  slowly  pass  the  window,  the  light  seeming  to 
come  from  a lamp  in  his  outstretched  hand.  All  the 
superstitious  tales  she  had  heard  of  the  place  rushed 
into  her  mind  ; this  must  be  the  apparition  of  the  Gray 
Friar.  Charlotte  Guise  had  an  awful  dread  of  reve- 
nants,  and  she  turned  sick  and  faint. 

With  a cry,  only  half-suppressed,  bursting  from  her 
parted  lips,  she  caught  up  the  candle,  afraid  to  stay,  and 
flew  through  the  door  into  the  narrow  passage.  The 
outer  door  was  opening  to  her  hand,  when  the  voice  of 
Harry  Castlemaine  was  heard  in  the  corridor,  almost 
close  to  the  door. — The  Master  of  Grey  lands. 


WOODWORTH,  Samuel,  an  American  poet 
****d  journalist,  born  at  Scituate,  Mass.,  January 
*j>  178 5 ; died  in  New  York,  December  9,  1842. 
He  served  an  apprenticeship  in  a newspaper  office 
in  Boston ; worked  for  a year  as  a journeyman  ; 
then  went  to  New  Haven,  where  he  started  a 
weekly  journal,  The  Belles  Lettres  Repository , of 
vhich  he  was  editor,  publisher,  printer,  and  some- 
times carrier;  but  the  journal  lived  only  eight 
weeks.  In  1809  he  went  to  New  York,  where  he 
engaged  in  several  literary  enterprises.  He  con- 
ducted a weekly  journal,  entitled  The  War , edited 
a Swedenborgian  monthly  magazine,  and  wrote 
The  Champions  of  Freedom,  a novel,  founded  on  the 
War  of  1812.  He  put  forth  numerous  patriotic 
songs,  and  composed  several  melodramas,  among 
which  is  The  Forest  Rose , which  was  popular  in  its 
day.  In  1823,  in  conjunction  with  George  P. 
Morris,  he  established  the  New  York  Mirror , with 
which,  however,  his  connection  was  brief.  Tow- 
ard the  close  of  his  life  he  was  disabled  by  paral- 
ysis, and  received  a substantial  complimentary 
benefit  at  the  National  Theatre.  He  was  intimate 
with  the  literary  men  of  his  day,  and  Halleck’s 
poem  To  a Poet's  Daughter  was  written  in  the 
album  of  the  daughter  of  Woodworth.  His  per- 
manent reputation  as  a poet  rests  wholly  upon 
The  Old  Oaken  Bucket . 

(391) 


59* 


SAMUEL  WOODWORTH 


THE  OLD  OAKEN  BUCKET. 


How  dear  to  this  heart  are  the  scenes  of  my  childhood, 
When  fond  recollection  presents  them  to  view ! 

The  orchard,  the  meadow,  the  deep-tangled  wild-wood, 
And  every  loved  spot  that  my  infancy  knew  ; 

The  wide-spreading  pond,  and  the  mill  that  stood  by  it, 
The  bridge,  and  the  rock  where  the  cataract  fell  ; 
The  cot  of  my  father,  the  dairy-house  nigh  it, 

And  e’en  the  rude  bucket  which  hung  in  the  well  : 
The  old  oaken  bucket,  the  iron-bound  bucket, 

The  moss-covered  bucket,  which  hung  in  the  well ! 

That  moss-covered  vessel  I hail  as  a treasure  ; 

For  often  at  noon,  when  returned  from  the  field, 

I found  it  the  source  of  an  exquisite  pleasure, 

The  purest  and  sweetest  that  Nature  can  yield. 

How  ardent  I seized  it,  with  hands  that  were  glowing, 
And  quick  to  the  white-pebbled  bottom  it  fell, 

Then  soon,  with  the  emblem  of  truth  overflowing, 

And  dripping  with  coolness,  it  rose  from  the  well  : 
The  old  oaken  bucket,  the  iron-bound  bucket, 

The  moss-covered  bucket,  arose  from  the  well. 

How  sweet  from  the  green,  mossy  brim  to  receive  it, 
As,  poised  on  the  curb,  it  inclined  to  my  lips  ! 

Not  a full,  blushing  goblet  could  tempt  me  to  leave  its 
Though  filled  with  the  nectar  that  Jupiter  sips. 

And  now,  far  removed  from  the  loved  situation, 

The  tear  of  regret  will  intrusively  swell, 

As  fancy  returns  to  my  father’s  plantation, 

And  sighs  for  the  bucket  which  hangs  in  the  well : 
The  old  oaken  bucket,  the  iron-bound  bucket, 

The  moss-covered  bucket,  which  hangs  in  the  welh 


WOOLSEY,  Sarah  Chauncey  (Susan  Cool- 
idge,  pseudonym),  an  American  writer  for  chil- 
dren, born  at  Cleveland,  Ohio,  about  1845.  She  is 
the  niece  of  Theodore  D.  Woolsey.  Her  books 
include  The  New  Years  Bargain  (1871);  What  Katy 
Did  (1872) ; For  Slimmer  Afternoons  (1876) ; Verses 
(1881);  A Guernsey  Lily  (1881);  A Round  Dozen 
(1883);  A Little  Country  Girl  ( 1885);  What  Katy 
Did  Next  (1886) ; Clover  (1888) ; Just  Sixteen  (1890)  ; 
Poems  { 1890);  In  the  High  Valley  (1891);  Rhymes 
and  Ballads  for  Boys  and  Girls  (1892) ; The  Barberry 
Bush  (1893),  and  Not  Quit * Eighteen  (1894). 

“ . . . That  ever-delightful  author,  Susan 

Coolidge,”  says  the  Critic , reviewing  In  the  High 
Valley.  “Miss  Woolsey  knows  as  well  what  is 
good  for  a girl’s  mind  as  what  will  delight  her 
heart  — knows  how  to  avoid  the  weakly  senti- 
mental, the  emotional,  the  abstruse,  the  lachry- 
mose, and  the  artificial  kinds  of  literature  that 
make  of  some  children’s  books  mere  miniature 
novels.  And  she  knows  just  what  girls  do  and  say 
when  they  are  left  to  themselves.” 

LOHENGRIN. 

To  have  touched  heaven  and  failed  to  enter  in, 

Ah,  Elsa,  prone  upon  the  lonely  shore, 

Watching  the  swan-wings  beat  upon  the  blue. 
Watching  the  glimmer  of  the  silver  mail 
Like  flash  of  foam,  till  all  are  lost  to  view; 

(393) 


394 


SARAH  CHAUNCEY  WOOLSEY 


What  may  thy  sorrow  or  thy  watch  avail  ? 

He  cometh  nevermore. 

All  gone  the  new  hope  of  thy  yesterday : 

The  tender  gaze  and  strong  like  dewy  fire, 

The  gracious  form  with  airs  of  heaven  bedight, 
The  love  that  warmed  thy  being  like  a sun ; 

Thou  hadst  thy  choice  of  noonday  or  of  night, 
Now  the  swart  shadows  gather  one  by  one 
To  give  thee  thy  desire ! 

To  every  life  one  heavenly  chance  befalls  ; 

To  every  soul  a moment  big  with  fate, 

When,  grown  impatient  with  need  and  fear, 

It  cries  for  help,  and  lo ! from  close  at  hand 
The  voice  celestial  answers,  “ I am  here  ! ” 

Oh,  blessed  souls,  made  wise  to  understand, 
Made  bravely  glad  to  wait. 

But  thou,  pale  watcher  on  the  lonely  shore 
Where  the  surf  thunders  and  the  foam-bells  fly, 
Is  there  no  place  for  penitence  and  pain  ? 

No  saving  grace  in  thy  all-piteous  rue? 

Will  the  bright  vision  never  come  again  ? 

Alas,  the  swan-wings  vanish  in  the  blue. 

There  cometh  no  reply. 


WOOLSEY,  Theodore  Dwight,  an  eminent 
American  educator  and  political  and  legal  writer, 
born  in  New  York  City,  October  31,  1801 ; died 
at  New  Haven,  Conn.,  July  1, 1889.  He  was  grad- 
uated at  Yale  in  1820.  After  a course  of  theology 
at  Princeton,  he  was  tutor  at  Yale  two  years,  a 
student  in  Germany  (1827-30),  and,  on  his  return, 
was  Professor  of  Greek  at  Yale  until  1846,  when 
he  was  chosen  president,  retaining  the  office 
twenty-five  years.  He  received  the  degree  of 
D.D.  from  Harvard  in  1847,  and  of  LL.D.  from 
the  same  university  in  1886.  Among  his  pub- 
lications are  editions  of  the  Alcestis  of  Euripides, 
the  Antigone  and  the  Electra  of  Sophocles,  the 
Prometheus  of  ^Eschylus,  and  the  Gorgias  of  Plato  ; 
also,  Introduction  to  the  Study  of  International  Law 
(i860) — regarded  as  an  authority ; Essay  on  Divorce 
and  Divorce  Legislation  (1869) ; Serving  Our  Genera- 
tion and  God's  Guidance  in  Youth  (1871) ; The  Re- 
ligion of  the  Present  and  the  Future  (1871);  Manual 
of  Political  Ethics  ; Civil  Liberty  and  Self-Govern- 
ment; Political  Science  ; Inauguration  Discourses  on 
College  Education , and  Historical  Discourses  at  the 
150th  Anniversary  of  the  Forming  of  Yale  College . 

THE  MONROE  DOCTRINE. 

The  history  of  this  doctrine  is,  in  brief,  the  following  v 
At  Verona  [1822]  the  subject  was  agitated  of  attempt- 
(.395-) 


396  THEODORE  DWIGHT  WOOLSEY 

ing,  m conformity  with  the  known  wishes  of  absolutists 
in  Spain,  to  bring  back  the  Spanish  colonies  into  sub- 
jection to  the  mother-country.  This  fact  having  been 
communicated  to  our  government  by  that  of  Great 
Britain  in  1823,  and  the  importance  of  some  public  pro- 
test on  our  part  being  insisted  upon,  President  Monroe, 
in  his  annual  message,  used  the  following  language  : 
“ That  we  should  consider  any  attempt  (on  the  part  of 
the  allied  powers)  to  extend  their  system  to  any  portion 
of  this  hemisphere  as  dangerous  to  our  peace  and  safe- 
ty,” and  again,  “ that  we  could  not  view  any  interposi- 
tion for  the  purpose  of  oppressing  (governments  on  this 
side  of  the  Atlantic  whose  independence  we  had  ac- 
knowledged), or  controlling  in  any  manner  their  des- 
tiny by  any  European  power,  in  any  other  light  than  as 
a manifestation  of  an  unfriendly  disposition  toward  the 
United  States.”  Soon  afterward  a resolution  was 
moved  in  Congress,  embodying  the  same  principle,  but 
was  never  called  up.  But  the  mere  declaration  of  the 
President,  meeting  with  the  full  sympathy  of  England, 
put  an  end  to  the  designs  to  which  the  message  refers. 

In  another  place  in  the  same  message,  while  alluding 
to  the  question  of  boundary  on  the  Pacific  between  the 
United  States  and  Russia,  the  President  speaks  thus  : 
“ The  occasion  has  been  judged  proper  for  asserting  as 
a principle,  in  which  the  rights  and  interests  of  the 
United  States  are  involved,  that  the  American  conti- 
nents, by  the  free  and  independent  condition  which  they 
have  assumed  and  maintain,  are  henceforth  not  to  be 
considered  as  subjects  of  future  colonization  by  any 
European  power.”  Was  it  intended  by  this  to  preclude 
the  South  American  republics,  without  their  will,  from 
receiving  such  colonies  within  their  borders — of  sur- 
rendering their  territory  for  that  purpose?  Such  a 
thing,  probably,  was  not  thought  of.  Mr.  Adams,  when 
President  in  1825,  thus  refers  to  Mr.  Monroe’s  principle, 
while  speaking  in  a special  message  of  a congress  at 
Panama  : “ An  agreement  between  all  the  parties  rep- 
resented at  the  meeting,  that  each  will  guard  by  its  own 
means  against  the  establishment  of  any  future  European 
colony,  within  its  borders,  may  be  found  desirable. 
This  was  more  than  two  years  since  announced  by  my 


THEODORE  DWIGHT  WOOLSEY 


397 


predecessor  to  the  world,  as  a principle  resulting  from 
the  emancipation  of  both  the  American  continents.’1 
Mr.  Adams,  when  Secretary  of  State  under  Mr.  Monroe, 
originated  the  “ principle,”  and  must  have  known  what 
he  meant.  But  the  principle,  even  in  this  tame  form, 
was  repudiated  by  the  House  of  Representatives.  . . . 

On  the  whole  then,  (i.)  the  doctrine  is  not  a national 
one.  The  House  of  Representatives,  indeed,  had  no 
right  to  settle  questions  of  policy  or  of  international 
law.  But  the  Cabinet  has  as  little.  The  opinion  of  one 
part  of  the  Government  neutralized  that  of  another. 
(2.)  The  principle  first  mentioned  of  resisting  attempts 
to  overthrow  the  liberties  of  the  Spanish  republics,  was 
one  of  most  righteous  self-defence,  and  of  vital  impor- 
tance. . . . The  other  principle  of  prohibiting  Euro- 
pean colonization  was  vague.  . . , 

The  Monroe  doctrine  came  up  again  in  another  shape 
in  1848.  President  Polk,  having  announced  that  the 
Government  of  Yucatan  had  offered  the  dominion 
over  that  country  to  Great  Britain,  Spain,  and  the 
United  States,  urges  on  Congress  such  measures  as 
may  prevent  it  from  becoming  a colony  and  a part  of 
the  dominions  of  any  European  power.  . . . Mr. 

Calhoun,  in  his  speech  on  this  subject,  shows  that  the 
case  is  very  different  from  that  contemplated  by  Mr. 
Monroe.  . . 

To  lay  down  the  principle  that  the  acquisition  of  ter- 
ritory on  this  continent,  by  any  European  power,  can- 
not be  allowed  by  the  United  States,  would  go  far  be- 
yond any  measures  dictated  by  the  system  of  the  balance 
of  power,  for  the  rule  of  self-preservation  is  not  appli- 
cable in  our  case  : we  fear  no  neighbors.  To  lay  down 
the  principle  that  no  political  systems  unlike  our  own, 
no  change  from  republican  forms  to  those  of  monarch}’', 
can  be  endured  in  the  Americas,  would  be  a step  in  ad- 
vance of  the  congresses  at  Laybach  and  Verona,  for 
they  apprehended  destruction  to  their  political  fabrics, 
and  we  do  not.  But  to  resist  attempts  of  European 
powers  to  alter  the  constitutions  of  states  on  this  side 
of  the  water  is  a wise  and  just  opposition  to  interfer- 
ence.— Introduction  to  the  Study  of  International  Law. 


WOOLSON,  Constance  Fenimore,  an  Amer- 
ican novelist,  born  at  Claremont,  N.  H.,  in  1848; 
died  in  Venice,  Italy,  January  23,  1894.  She  was 
the  daughter  of  Charles  Jarvis  Woolson,  and  a 
great-niece  of  James  Fenimore  Cooper.  She  was 
educated  at  Cleveland  and  New  York.  From  1873 
to  1878  she  resided  in  Florida,  Georgia,  and  the 
Carolinas,  and  in  1879  s^e  went  to  Europe,  where 
she  afterward  resided.  Her  winters  were  spent 
in  Italy.  Her  literary  field  includes  sketches, 
poems,  stories,  and  novels,  which  appeared  in 
Harper  s and  other  magazines.  Her  books  are 
Castle  Nowhere : Lake  Country  Sketches  (1875); 
Two  Women  (1877);  Rodman  the  Keeper : Southern 
Sketches  (1880);  Anne  (1882) ; For  the  Major  (1883) ; 
East  Angels  (1886) ; Jupiter  Lights  (1889)  » The  Old 
Stone  House  (1893) ; Horace  Chase  (1894). 

“ She  had  such  a high  conception  of  her  art,” 
says  Charles  Dudley  Warner,  “that  she  thought 
no  pains  too  great  in  whatever  she  undertook.  Her 
conscience  was  never  set  at  ease  by  popularity,  and 
to  the  last  her  standard  was  not  popular  favor,  but 
her  own  high  conception  of  her  office  as  a writer. 
She  valued  her  art.  She  was  among  the  first  in 
America  to  bring  the  short  story  to  its  present  ex- 
cellence ; that  is,  the  short  story  as  a social  study  in 
distinction  from  the  sketch  of  character  and  the  re- 
lation of  incident.  . . . She  was  an  observer 

(398) 


CONSTANCE  FEN/MORE  WO  OLSON 


309 


a sympathetic  observer  and  a refined  observer, 
entering  sufficiently  into  the  analytic  mode  of  the 
time,  but  she  had  courage  to  deal  with  the  pas- 
sions and  life  as  it  is.  There  lived  among  our 
writers  no  one  in  fuller  sympathy  with  American 
life  and  character,  none  prouder  of  her  country 
and  all  that  is  best  in  it,  and  no  one  who  brought 
to  the  task  of  delineating  them  a clearer  moral 
vision  and  a more  refined  personality/* 

IN  THE  MONNLUNGS. 

They  did  not  speak  often.  Winthrop  was  attending 
to  the  boat’s  course,  Margaret  had  turned  and  was 
sitting  so  that  she  could  scan  the  water  and  direct  him 
a little.  Her  nervousness  had  disappeared  ; either  she 
had  been  able  to  repress  it,  or  it  had  faded  in  the  pres- 
ence of  the  responsibility  she  had  assumed  in  under- 
taking to  act  as  guide  through  that  strange  water-land 
of  the  Monnlungs,  whose  winding  channels  she  had 
heretofore  seen  only  in  the  light  of  day.  Even  in  the 
light  of  day  they  were  mysterious  ; the  enormous  trees, 
thickly  foliaged  at  the  top,  kept  the  sun  from  penetrat- 
ing to  the  water,  the  masses  of  vines  shut  out  still  fur- 
ther the  light,  and  shut  in  the  perfumes  of  the  myriad 
flowers. 

Channels  opened  out  on  all  sides.  Only  one  was  the 
right  one.  Should  she  be  able  to  follow  it  ? the  land- 
marks she  knew — certain  banks  of  shrubs,  a tree  trunk 
of  peculiar  shape,  a sharp  bend,  a small  bay  full  of 
“ knees  ” — should  she  know  them  again  by  night  ? 
There  came  to  her  suddenly  the  memory  of  a little  arena 
— an  arena  where  the  flowering  vines  hung  straight 
down  from  the  tree-tops  to  the  water  all  round,  like 
tapestry,  and  where  the  perfumes  were  densely  thick. 

“Are  you  cold?”  said  Winthrop.  “You  can’t  be — 
this  warm  night.”  The  slightness  of  the  canoe  had 
betrayed  what  he  thought  was  a shiver.  “ No,  I’m  not 
cold.” 

“ The  best  thing  w<».  can  do  is  to  make  the  boat  as 


400 


CONSTANCE  FENIMORE  WO  OLSON 


bright  as  possible,”  he  went  on.  “ But  not  in  front 
that  would  only  be  blinding ; the  light  must  be  behind 
us.”  He  took  the  torch  from  the  bow,  lighted  three 
others,  and  stuck  them  all  into  the  canoe’s  lining  of 
thin  strips  of  wood  at  the  stern. 

Primus  had  made  his  torches  long ; it  would  be  an 
hour  before  they  could  burn  down  sufficiently  to  endan- 
ger the  boat. 

Thus,  casting  a brilliant  orange-hued  glow  around 
them,  lighting  up  the  dark  water  vistas  to  the  right 
and  left  as  they  passed,  they  penetrated  into  the  dim, 
sweet  swamp. 

They  had  been  in  the  Monnlungs  half  an  hour.  Mar- 
garet acted  as  pilot ; half  kneeling,  half  sitting  at  the 
bow,  one  hand  on  the  canoe’s  edge,  her  face  turned  for- 
ward, she  gave  her  directions  slowly,  all  her  powers 
concentrated  upon  recalling  correctly  and  keeping  un- 
mixed from  present  impressions  her  memory  of  the 
channel. 

The  present  impressions  were  indeed  so  strange,  that 
a strong  exertion  of  will  was  necessary  to  prevent  the 
mind  from  becoming  fascinated  by  them,  from  forget- 
ting in  this  series  of  magic  pictures  the  different  aspect 
of  these  same  vistas  by  day.  Even  by  day  the  vistas 
were  alluring.  By  night,  lighted  up  by  the  flare  of  the 
approaching  torches,  at  first  vaguely,  then  brilliantly, 
then  vanishing  into  darkness  again  behind,  they  became 
unearthly,  exceeding  in  contrasts  of  color — reds,  yellows 
and  green,  all  of  them  edged  sharply  with  the  profound- 
est  gloom — the  most  striking  effects  of  the  painters 
who  have  devoted  their  lives  to  reproducing  light  and 
shade.  Lanse  had  explored  a part  of  the  Monnlungs. 
He  had  not  explored  it  all,  no  human  eye  had  as  yet 
beheld  some  of  its  mazes ; but  the  part  he  had  explored 
he  knew  well — he  had  even  made  a map  of  it.  Margaret 
had  seen  this  map  ; she  felt  sure,  too,  that  she  should 
know  the  channels  he  called  the  Lanes.  Her  idea,  upon 
entering,  had  been  to  follow  the  main  stream  to  the  first 
of  these  lanes,  there  turn  off  and  explore  the  lane  to  its 
end ; then,  returning  to  the  main  channel,  to  go  on  to 
the  second  lane  ; and  so  on  through  Lanse’s  part  of  the 
•wamp. 


CONSTANCE  FENIMORE  WOOLSON  4°* 

They  had  now  explored  two  of  the  lanes,  and  were 
entering  a third.  She  had  taken  off  her  hat,  and  thrown 
it  down  upon  the  cloak  beside  her.  “ It’s  so  oppress- 
ively  warm — in  here,”  she  said. 

It  was  not  oppressively  warm — not  warmer  than  a 
June  night  at  the  North.  But  the  air  was  perfectly 
still,  and  so  sweet  that  it  was  enervating. 

The  forest  grew  denser  along  this  third  lane  as  they 
advanced.  The  trees  stood  nearer  together,  and  silver 
moss  now  began  to  hang  down  in  long,  filmy  veils, 
thicker  and  thicker,  from  all  the  branches.  Mixed  with 
the  moss,  vines  showed  themselves  ; in  strange  convolu- 
tions, they  went  up  out  of  sight ; in  girth  they  were  as 
large  as  small  trees  ; they  appeared  to  have  not  a leaf, 
but  to  be  dry,  naked,  chocolate-brown  growths,  twisting 
themselves  about  hither  and  thither  for  their  own  enter- 
tainment. 

This  was  the  appearance  below.  But  above,  there 
was  another  story  to  tell : for  here  were  interminable 
flat  beds  of  broad  green  leaves,  spread  out  over  the  out- 
side of  the  roof  of  foliage — leaves  that  belonged  to  these 
same  naked,  coiling  growths  below  ; the  vines  had  found 
themselves  obliged  to  climb  to  the  very  top  in  order  to 
get  a ray  of  sunshine  for  their  greenery. 

For  there  was  no  sky  for  anybody  in  the  Monnlungs  ; 
the  deep,  solid  roof  of  interlocked  branches  stretched 
miles  long,  miles  wide,  like  a close,  tight  cover,  over  the 
entire  place.  The  general  light  of  day  came  filtering 
through,  dyed  with  much  green,  quenched  into  black- 
ness at  the  ends  of  the  vistas ; but  actual  sunbeams 
never  came,  never  gleamed,  year  in  year  out,  across  the 
clear  darkness  of  the  broad  water  floor.  The  water  on 
this  floor  was  always  pellucid  ; whether  it  was  the  deep 
current  of  the  main  channel,  or  the  shallower  tide  that 
stood  motionless  over  all  the  rest  of  the  expanse,  no- 
where was  there  the  least  appearance  of  mud  ; the  lake 
and  the  streams,  red-brown  in  hue,  were  as  clear  as  so 
much  fine  wine  ; the  tree  trunks  rose  cleanly  from  this 
transparent  tide  ; their  huge  roots  could  be  seen  coiling 
on  the  bottom  much  as  the  great  vines  coiled  in  the  air 
above.  These  gray-white,  bald  cypresses  had  a monu- 
mental aspect,  like  the  columns  of  a Gothic  cathedral,  as 


402 


CONSTANCE  FENlMORE  WOOLSON 


they  rose,  erect  and  branchless,  disappearing  above  in 
the  mist  of  the  moss.  The  moss  presently  began  to 
take  on  an  additional  witchery  by  becoming  decked  with 
flowers ; up  to  a certain  height  these  flowers  had  their 
roots  in  the  earth  ; but  above  these  were  other  blossoms 
— air-plants,  some  vividly  tinted,  flaring,  and  gaping, 
others  so  small  and  so  flat  on  the  moss  that  they  were 
like  the  embroidered  flowers  on  lace,  only  they  were 
done  in  colors. 

“ I detest  this  moss,”  said  Margaret,  as  it  grew  thicker 
and  thicker,  so  that  there  wras  nothing  to  be  seen  but 
the  silver  webs  ; “ I feel  strangled  in  it— suffocated.” 

“ Oh,  but  it’s  beautiful,”  said  Winthrop.  “ Don’t 
you  see  the  colors  it  takes  on  ? Gray,  then  silver,  then 
almost  pink  as  we  pass  ; then  gray  and  ghostly  again.” 

For  all  answer  she  called  her  husband’s  name.  She 
had  called  it  in  this  way  at  intervals  ever  since  they  en- 
tered the  swamp. 

“The  light  we  carry  penetrates  much  farther  than 
your  voice,”  Winthrop  remarked. 

“ I want  him  to  know  who  it  is.” 

“ Oh,  he’ll  know— such  a devoted  wife ! who  else 
could  it  be  ? ” . . . 

“ If  anything  should  happen  to  Lanse  that  I might 
have  prevented  by  keeping  on  now,  how  should  I 
ever — — ” 

“ Oh,  keep  on,  keep  on  ; bring  him  safely  home  and 
take  every  care  of  him— he  has  done  so  much  to  deserve 
these  efforts  on  your  part  l ” 

They  went  on. 

And  now  the  stream  was  bringing  them  toward  the 
place  Margaret  had  thought  of  upon  entering — a bower 
in  the  heart  of  the  Monnlungs,  or  rather  a long,  defile- 
like chink  between  two  high  cliffs,  the  cliffs  being  a 
dense  mass  of  flowering  shrubs. 

Winthrop  made  no  comment  as  they  entered  this 
blossoming  pass  ; Margaret  did  not  speak.  The  air  was 
loaded  with  sweetness  ; she  put  her  hands  on  the  edge 
of  the  canoe  to  steady  herself.  Then  she  looked  up,  as 
if  in  search  of  fresher  air,  or  to  see  how  high  the  flowers 
ascended.  But  there  was  no  fresher  air,  and  the  flowers 
went  up  out  of  sight.  The  defile  grew  narrower,  the 


CONSTANCE  FEMMORE  WO  OLSON'  403 

atmosphere  became  so  heavy  that  they  could  taste  the 
perfume  in  their  mouths.  After  another  five  minutes 
Margaret  drew  a long  breath — she  had  apparently  been 
trying  to  breathe  as  little  as  possible.  “ I don’t  think 
I can— I am  afraid — — ” she  swayed,  then  sank  softly 
down  ; she  had  fainted. 

He  caught  her  in  his  arms,  and  laid  her  on  the  canoe’s 
bottom,  her  head  on  the  cloak.  He  looked  at  the  water, 
but  the  thought  of  the  dark  tide’s  touching  that  fair 
face  was  repugnant  to  him.  He  bent  down  and  spoke 
to  her,  and  smoothed  her  hair.  But  that  was  advanc- 
ing nothing,  and  he  began  to  chafe  her  hands.  Then 
suddenly  he  rose  and  taking  the  paddle,  sent  the  canoe 
flying  along  between  the  high  bushes.  The  air  was 
visibly  thick  in  the  red  light  of  the  torches,  a miasma 
of  scent.  A branch  of  small  blossoms  with  the  perfume 
of  heliotrope  softly  brushed  against  his  cheek  ; he  struck 
it  aside  with  unnecessary  violence.  Exerting  all  his 
strength,  he  at  last  got  the  canoe  free  from  the  beauti- 
ful baleful  place.  When  Margaret  opened  her  eyes  they 
were  outside  ; she  was  lying  peacefully  on  the  cloak, 
and  he  was  still  paddling  vehemently. 

“ I am  ashamed,”  she  said,  as  she  raised  herself.  “ I 
suppose  I fainted  ? Perfumes  have  a great  effect  upon 
me  always.  I know  that  place  well,  I thought  of  it  be- 
fore we  entered  the  swamp  ; I thought  it  would  make 
me  dizzy,  but  I had  no  idea  that  it  would  make  me  faint 
away.  It  has  never  done  so  before ; the  scents  must  be 
j stronger  at  night.” 

She  still  seemed  weak  ; she  put  her  hand  to  her  head. 
Then  a thought  came  to  her  : she  sat  up  and  looked 
about,  scanning  the  trees  anxiously.  “I  hope  you 
haven’t  gone  wrong  ? How  far  are  we  from  the  narrow 
place— the  place  where  I fainted  ? ” 

“ I don’t  know  how  far.  But  we  haven’t  been  out  of 
it  more  than  five  or  six  minutes,  and  this  is  certainly 
the  channel.” 

“ Nothing  is  ‘certainly*  in  the  Monnlungs!  and  five 
minutes  is  quite  enough  time  to  get  lost  in — I don’t 
recognize  anything  here — we  ought  to  be  in  sight  of  a 
tree  that  has  a profile,  like  a face.” 

“ Perhaps  you  wouldn’t  know  it  at  night." 

Vol.  XXIV.—  2* 


CONSTANCE  FENIMORE  WO  OLSON 


404 

“ It’s  unmistakable.  No,  I am  sure  we  are  wrong. 
Please  go  back — go  back  at  once  to  the  narrow  place.” 

“ Where  is  ‘ back  * ?”  murmured  Winthrop  to  himself, 
after  he  had  surveyed  the  water  behind  him. 

And  the  question  was  a necessary  one.  What  he  had 
thought  was  “ certainly  the  channel  ” seemed  to  exist 
only  in  front;  there  was  no  channel  behind,  there  were 
only  broad  tree-filled  water  spaces,  vague  and  dark. 
They  could  see  nothing  of  the  thicker  foliage  of  the 
4<  narrow  place.” 

Margaret  clasped  her  hands.  “ We’re  lost ! ” 

“ No,  we’re  not  lost ; at  least  we  were  not  seven 
minutes  ago.  It  won’t  take  long  to  go  over  all  the 
water  that  is  seven  minutes  from  here.”  He  took  out 
one  of  the  torches  and  inserted  it  among  the  roots  of 
a cypress,  so  that  it  could  hold  itself  upright.  “ That’s 
our  guide  ; we  can  always  come  back  to  that  and  start 
again.” 

Margaret  no  longer  tried  to  direct ; she  sat  with  her 
face  toward  him,  leaving  the  guidance  to  him.  He 
started  back  in  what  he  thought  was  the  course  they 
had  just  traversed.  But  they  did  not  come  to  the  de- 
file of  flowers  ; and  suddenly  they  lost  sight  of  their 
beacon. 

“We  shall  see  it  again  in  a moment,”  he  said.  But 
they  did  not  see  it.  They  floated  in  and  out  among  the 
great  cypresses,  he  plunged  his  paddle  down  over  the 
side,  and  struck  bottom  ; they  were  out  of  the  channel 
and  in  the  shallows — the  great  Monnlungs  Lake.^ 
East  Angels. 


Ms. 

if  vm 

CF  HUHBiS 


WORDSWORTH,  William,  an  eminent  Eng- 
lish poet,  born  at  Cockermouth,  in  the  hill 
region  of  Cumberland,  April  7,  1770;  died  at 
Rydal  Mount,  Westmoreland,  April  23,  1850. 
His  father,  who  was  law  agent  for  Sir  James 
Lowther,  afterward  Earl  of  Lonsdale,  died  when 
his  son  was  thirteen,  his  mother  having  died  sev- 
eral years  before.  In  1787  he  was  entered  at  St- 
John’s  College,  Cambridge,  where  he  took  his 
Bachelor’s  degree  in  1791.  Soon  afterward  he 
went  to  France,  where  he  remained  about  a year, 
returning  to  England  at  the  opening  of  the 
“Reign  of  Terror.”  His  friends  urged  him  to 
enter  the  Church ; but  he  wished  to  devote  him- 
self to  poetry.  Raisley  Calvert,  a young  friend 
of  his,  dying  in  1795,  left  him  a legacy  of  ^900, 
which  enabled  him  to  carry  out  his  wish.  Of  his 
modest  way  of  life  he  says : “ Upon  the  interest  of 
the  £900 — £400  being  laid  out  in  an  annuity,  with 
£200  deducted  from  the  principal,  and  £100,  a 
legacy  to  my  sister,  and  £ 100  mere  which  the 
Lyrical  Ballads  brought  me,  my  sister  and  I com 
trived  to  live  seven  years,  nearly  eight.”  To  this 
sister,  Dorothy  Wordsworth,  Wordsworth  owed 
more  than  to  any  otner  person — his  wife  not  ex- 
cepted. In  time,  a debt  of  some  ^3,000  which  had 
been  due  to  his  father  was  paid,  and  the  poet  was 
placed  beyond  pecuniary  straits.  In  1798  Words- 


4o 6 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH 


worth  and  his  sister,  accompanied  by  Coleridge, 
went  to  Germany.  Returning  after  a few  months, 
Wordsworth  took  up  his  residence  at  Grassmere, 
in  the  Lake  region,  and  finally,  in  1813,  at  Rydal 
Mount,  his  home  for  the  remaining  thirty-seven 
years  of  his  life,  which  was  singularly  devoid  of 
external  incident.  The  income  derived  from  his 
writings  was  never  large  ; but  in  1813  he  received, 
through  the  influence  of  his  fast  friend,  the  Earl  of 
Lonsdale,  the  appointment  of  Distributor  of 
Stamps  for  Westmoreland,  which  brought  him 
^500  a year.  This  position  he  resigned  in  1842, 
in  favor  of  his  son,  he  himself  receiving  a pension 
of  ^300.  Southey,  dying  in  1843,  was  succeeded 
as  Poet  Laureate  by  Wordsworth,  who  was  suc- 
ceeded by  Tennyson.  The  Life  of  Wordsworth 
has  been  written  by  his  nephew,  the  Rev.  Chris- 
topher Wordsworth  (1851),  and  by  Frederick 
Myers  in  “ English  Men  of  Letters  ” (1882).  Many 
interesting  personal  details  of  him  are  contained 
in  Mr.  Crabb  Robinson’s  Diary  (1869). 

Wordsworth’s  first  volume  of  Poems  appeared 
in  1793  ; in  1798  was  published  the  Lyrical  Ballads # 
one  of  which  was  Coleridge’s  Ancient  Mariner , all 
the  others  being  by  Wordsworth.  From  time 
to  time  he  made  excursions  in  Wales,  Scotland, 
Switzerland,  and  Italy,  of  all  of  which  he  put  forth 
Memorials  in  verse.  His  other  poetical  works  will 
be  more  specially  mentioned  hereinafter.  His 
Poetical  Works  have  been  arranged  by  himself  in 
accordance  with  their  subject  matter.  His  prose 
writings,  which  are  not  numerous,  consist  mainly 
of  introductions  to  his  several  poems,  a political 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH 


407 


tract  on  the  u Convention  of  Cintra,”  and  an  ad- 
mirable paper  signed  “Mathetes”  in  Coleridge’s 
Friend. 

The  following  poem  is  the  best  known  of  his 
Lyrical  Ballads  : 

WE  ARE  SEVEN. 

A simple  child, 

That  lightly  draws  its  breath, 

And  feels  its  life  in  every  limb, 

What  should  it  know  of  death  ? 

I met  a little  cottage  girl : 

She  was  eight  years  old,  she  said ; 

Her  hair  was  thick  with  many  a curl 
That  clustered  round  her  head. 

She  had  a rustic,  woodland  air. 

And  she  was  wildly  clad ; 

Her  eyes  were  fair,  and  very  fair 
Her  beauty  made  me  glad. 

“ Sisters  and  brothers,  little  maid. 

How  many  may  you  be  ? ” 

“ How  many  ? Seven  in  all,”  she  said, 

And  wondering  looked  at  me. 

* And  where  are  they  ? I pray  you  tell.” 

She  answered,  “ Seven  are  we  ; 

And  two  of  us  at  Conway  dwell, 

And  two  are  gone  to  sea  ; 

w Two  of  us  in  the  church-yard  lie. 

My  sister  and  my  brother  ; 

And,  in  the  church-yard  cottage,  I 
Dwell  near  them  with  my  mother.” 

“ You  say  that  two  at  Conway  dwell, 

And  two  are  gone  to  sea, 

Yet  ye  are  seven  ? I pray  you  tell, 

Sweet  maid,  how  this  may  be,” 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH 


Then  did  the  little  maid  reply, 

“ Seven  boys  and  girls  are  we  ; 

Two  of  us  in  the  church-yard  lie 
Beneath  the  church-yard  tree.” 

“You  run  about,  my  little  maid, 

Your  limbs  they  are  alive  ; 

If  two  are  in  the  church-yard  laid, 

Then  ye  are  only  five.” 

“ Their  graves  are  green,  they  may  be  seen,” 
The  little  maid  replied  : 

“ Twelve  steps  or  more  from  my  mother’s  door, 
And  they  are  side  by  side. 

“ My  stockings  there  I often  knit ; 

My  kerchief  there  I hem  ; 

And  there  upon  the  ground  I sit— 

I sit  and  sing  to  them. 

“And  often  after  sunset,  sir. 

When  it  is  light  and  fair 
I take  my  Tttle  porringer, 

And  eat  my  supper  there. 

“ The  first  that  died  was  Sister  Jane ; 

In  bed  she  moaning  lay, 

Till  God  released  her  of  her  pain  ; 

And  then  she  went  away. 

“ So  in  the  church-yard  she  was  laid ; 

And,  when  the  grass  was  dry, 

Together  round  her  grave  we  played, 

My  Brother  John  and  I. 

“ And  when  the  ground  was  white  with  snow, 
And  I could  run  and  slide, 

My  brother  John  was  forced  to  go, 

And  he  lies  by  her  side.” 

“ How  many  are  you,  then,”  said  I, 

“ If  they  two  are  in  heaven  ? ” 

Quick  was  the  little  maid’s  reply : 

“ O Master  ! we  are  seven.” 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH 


:o9 


* But  they  are  dead  ; those  two  are  dead! 

Their  spirits  are  in  heaven  ! ” 

*Twas  throwing  words  away  ; for  still 
The  little  maid  would  have  her  will. 

And  said,  “ Nay,  we  are  seven  ! ” 

In  the  summer  of  1798  Wordsworth,  accompa- 
nied by  his  sister,  made  a tour  along  the  banks  of 
the  Wye,  and  there,  a few  miles  above  Tintern 
Abbey,  he  composed  one  of  his  best  poems,  the 
concluding  portion  of  which  was  directly  ad- 
dressed to  his  sister. 

TO  HIS  SISTER,  DOROTHY. 

. . . . I have  learned 

To  look  on  Nature  not  as  in  the  hour 
Of  thoughtless  youth  ; but  hearing  oftentimes 
The  sad,  still  music  of  humanity, 

Not  harsh  or  grating,  though  of  ample  power 
To  chasten  and  subdue.  And  I have  felt, 

A presence  that  disturbs  me  with  the  joy 
Of  elevated  thoughts  ; a sense  sublime 
Of  something  far  more  deeply  interfused, 

Whose  dwelling  is  in  the  lights  of  setting  suns, 

And  the  round  ocean  and  the  living  air, 

And  the  blue  sky,  and  in  the  mind  of  man. 

A motion  and  a spirit  that  impels 

All  thinking  things,  all  objects  of  all  thoughts, 

And  rolls  through  all  things. 

Therefore  am  I still 
A lover  of  the  meadows  and  the  woods 
And  mountains  ; and  of  all  that  we  behold 
From  this  green  earth  ; of  all  the  mighty  world 
Of  eye  and  ear — -both  of  what  they  half  create, 

And  what  perceive  ; well  pleased  to  recognize 
In  Nature  and  the  language  of  the  Sense 
The  anchor  of  my  purest  thoughts,  the  muse, 

The  guide,  the  guardian  of  my  heart,  and  soul 
Of  all  my  moral  being. 

Nor  perchance. 


4io 


WILLTAM  WORDS  WORT  FT 


If  I were  not  thus  taught,  should  I the  more 
Suffer  my  genial  spirits  to  decay. 

For  thou  wert  with  me  here  upon  the  banks 
Of  thy  dear  river  : thou  my  dearest  Friend — 

My  dear,  dear  Friend  ! and  in  thy  voice  I catch 
The  language  of  my  former  heart,  and  read 
My  former  pleasures  in  the  shooting  lights 
Of  thy  wild  eyes. 

Oh  ! yet  a little  while 
May  I behold  in  thee  what  I was  once, 

My  dear,  dear  Sister ! And  this  prayer  I makw 
Knowing  that  Nature  never  did  betray 
The  heart  that  loved  her.  ’Tis  her  privilege 
Through  all  the  years  of  this  one  life,  to  lead 
From  joy  to  joy  ; for  she  can  so  inform 
The  mind  that  is  within  us — so  impress 
With  quietness  and  beauty,  and  so  feed 
With  lofty  thoughts — that  neither  evil  tongues, 

Rash  judgments,  nor  the  sneers  of  selfish  men. 

Nor  greetings  where  no  kindness  is,  nor  all 
The  dreary  intercourse  of  daily  life, 

Shall  e’er  prevail  against  us,  or  disturb 
Our  cheerful  faith  that  all  which  we  behold 
Is  full  of  blessings. 

Therefore  let  the  moon 
Shine  on  thee  in  thy  solitary  walk  ; 

And  let  the  misty  mountain  winds  be  free 
To  blow  against  thee.  And  in  after  years, 

When  these  wild  ecstasies  shall  be  matured 
Into  a sober  pleasure — when  thy  mind 
Shall  be  a mansion  for  all  lovely  forms, 

Thy  memory  be  as  a dwelling-place 

For  all  sweet  sounds  and  harmonies — oh,  then, 

If  solitude,  or  fear,  or  pain,  or  grief 

Should  be  thy  portion,  with  what  healing  thoughts 

Of  tender  joy  wilt  thou  remember  me, 

And  these  my  exhortations  ! 

Nor,  perchance 

If  I should  be  where  I no  more  can  hear 

Thy  voice,  nor  catch  from  thy  wild  eyes  these  gleami 

Of  past  existence — wilt  thou  then  forget 

That  on  the  banks  of  this  delightful  stream 


m uahBv 

IF  THE 

W8SSIT  OF  BUMS 


44  She  was  a phantom  of  delight 
When  first  she  gleamed  upon  my  sight.*4 


FaiaUog  by  R.  van  Blaaa. 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH 


411 

We  stood  together  ; and  that  I,  so  long 
A worshipper  of  Nature,  hither  came 
Unwearied  in  that  service  : rather  say. 

With  warmer  love,  oh,  with  far  deeper  zeal 
Of  holier  love.  Nor  wilt  thou  then  forget 
That  after  many  years  of  wanderings,  many  years 
Of  absence,  these  steep  woods  and  lofty  cliffs, 

And  this  green,  pastoral  landscape,  were  to  me 
More  dear  both  for  themselves  and  for  thy  sake. 

— From  Lines  Composed  a Few  Miles  above 
Tintern  Abbey. 

The  possibility  of  future  sorrow  thus  hinted  at 
came  indeed  to  be  a reality.  Thirty  years  after- 
ward we  catch  occasional  glimpses  of  Dorothy 
Wordsworth  in  the  home  of  her  brother,  broken 
in  health  and  weakened  in  mind — hardly  a shad- 
ow of  her  glad  youth.  But  those  sad  happenings 
were  in  the  far  future.  In  1802  Wordsworth 
married  Mary  Hutchinson,  whom  he  had  known 
from  boyhood;  who  died  in  1859,  after  forty- 
eight  years  of  wedded  life,  and  nine  years  of 
widowhood,  and  of  whom  he  wrote,  two  years 
after  their  marriage : 

UPON  HIS  WIFE, 

She  was  a Phantom  of  delight 
When  first  she  gleamed  upon  my  sight 
A lovely  Apparition,  sent 
To  be  a moment’s  ornament. 

Her  eyes  as  stars  of  Twilight  fair, 

Like  Twilight’s,  too,  her  dusky  hair, 

But  all  things  else  about  her  drawn 
From  May-time  and  the  cheerful  Dawn ; 

A dancing  Shape,  an  Image  gay, 

To  haunt,  to  startle,  and  waylay, 

I saw  her,  upon  nearer  view, 

A Spirit,  yet  a Woman,  too ; 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH 


412 


Her  household  motions  light  and  free. 

And  steps  of  virgin-liberty  ; 

A countenance  in  which  did  meet 
Sweet  records,  promises  as  sweet ; 

A creature  not  too  bright  and  good 
For  human  nature’s  daily  food, 

For  transient  sorrows,  simple  wiles, 

Praise,  blame,  love,  kisses,  tears,  and  smiles. 

And  now  I see  with  eye  serene 
The  very  pulse  of  the  machine  ; 

A being  breathing  thoughtful  breath, 

A traveller  between  life  and  death  ; 

The  reason  firm,  the  temperate  will, 

Endurance,  foresight,  strength,  and  skill ; 

A perfect  Woman,  nobly  planned, 

To  warn,  to  comfort,  and  command  ; 

And  yet  a Spirit  still,  and  bright 
With  something  of  angelic  light. 

The  Prehide , a poem  which  had  been  slowly 
growing  up  for  half  a dozen  years,  was  completed 
in  1805.  It  was  addressed  to  Coleridge,  to  whom 
portions  were  sent  from  time  to  time,  and  to  whom 
the  whole  was  recited  when  finished— this  recital 
giving  occasion  for  one  of  the  finest  of  Coleridge’s 
poems.  The  Prelude , which  was  not  published 
Until  1850,  concludes  thus: 

CLOSE  OF  THE  “ PRELUDE.” 

Oh  ! yet  a few  short  years  of  useful  life, 

And  all  will  be  complete — thy  race  be  run, 

Thy  monument  of  glory  will  be  raised  ; 

Then,  though  (too  weak  to  tread  the  ways  of  truth) 
This  age  fall  back  to  old  idolatry, 

Though  men  return  to  servitude  as  fast 

As  the  tide  ebbs,  to  ignominy  and  shame 

By  nations  sink  together,  we  shall  still 

Find  solace — knowing  what  we  have  learnt  to  know, 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH  413 

Rich  in  true  happiness  if  allowed  to  be 
Faithful  alike  in  forwarding  a day 
Of  firmer  trust,  joint  laborers  in  the  work 
(Should  Providence  such  grace  to  us  vouchsafe) 

Of  their  deliverance,  surely  yet  to  come. 

Prophets  of  Nature,  we  to  them  will  speak 
A lasting  inspiration,  sanctified 
By  reason,  blest  by  faith. 

What  we  have  loved 

Others  will  love,  and  we  will  teach  them  how  ; 
Instruct  them  how  the  mind  of  man  becomes 
A thousand  times  more  beautiful  than  the  earth 
On  which  he  dwells,  above  this  frame  of  things 
(Which,  ’mid  all  revolution  in  the  hopes 
And  fears  of  men,  doth  still  remain  unchanged) 

In  beauty  exalted,  as  it  is  itself 
Of  quality  and  fabric  more  divine. 

The  great  work  to  which  Wordsworth  had  re- 
solved to  dedicate  himself  was,  as  he  says,  “ to 
compose  a philosophical  poem,  containing  views 
of  Man,  Nature,  and  Society ; and  to  be  entitled 
The  Recluse , as  having  for  its  principal  subject  the 
sensations  and  opinions  of  a poet  living  in  retire- 
ment.” The  original  design  was  only  partially 
carried  out.  The  Recluse  was  to  consist  of  three 
Parts.  Of  these,  the  first  Part  was  written,  but 
for  some  unexplained  reason  was  never  published 
by  him.  All  seems  to  have  been  destroyed  ex- 
cept a little  more  than  a hundred  lines,  which 
Wordsworth  says  “may  be  acceptable  as  a kind 
of  prospectus  of  the  design  and  scope  of  the  whole 
poem.” 

Of  the  purposed  Recluse , then,  we  have  only  the 
second  Part — the  Excursion  (1814),  which  de- 
scribes a tour  of  a few  days  among  the  hills  made 
by  the  Poet  in  company  with  a friend  whom  he 


414 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH 


calls  “The  Wanderer” — a man  who  In  youth 
and  early  manhood  has  been  a pedler,  who  now, 
far  advanced  beyond  mid-life,  has  retired  with  a 
moderate  competence.  He  is  not  devoid  of  a 
knowledge  of  books,  but  is  far  more  deeply  read 
in  the  great  Book  of  Nature ; a poet,  “ wanting 
only  the  accomplishment  of  verse.”  Into  the 
mouth  of  this  “Wanderer”  the  Poet  puts  many 
— most  indeed — of  the  loftiest  utterances  in  the 
Excursion . In  a few  cases  they  gain  something 
by  this  attribution ; but  usually  they  might  as 
well  have  been  spoken  directly  by  the  Poet  him- 
self or  by  some  of  the  other  interlocutors. 

THE  WANDERER’S  HYMN  OF  THANKSGIVING. 

How  beautiful  this  dome  of  sky ; 

And  the  vast  hills,  in  fluctuation  fixed 
At  Thy  command,  how  awful  ! Shall  the  Soul, 

Human  and  rational,  report  of  Thee 

Even  less  than  these  ? Be  mute  who  will,  who  can. 

Yet  I will  praise  Thee  with  impassioned  voice. 

My  lips,  that  may  forget  Thee  in  the  crowd, 

Cannot  forget  Thee  here,  where  Thou  hast  built 
For  Thy  own  glory  in  the  wilderness  ! 

Me  didst  Thou  constitute  a priest  of  Thine 
In  such  a temple  as  we  now  behold 
Reared  for  Thy  presence.  Therefore  I am  bound 
To  worship  here  and  everywhere — as  one, 

Not  doomed  to  ignorance,  though  forced  to  tread 
From  childhood  up  the  ways  of  poverty  ; 

From  unreflecting  ignorance  preserved, 

And  from  debasement  rescued.  By  Thy  grace 
The  particle  divine  remained  unquenched  ; 

And  *mid  the  wild  weeds  of  a rugged  soil 
Thy  bounty  caused  to  flourish  deathless  flowers, 

From  Paradise  transplanted.  Wintry  age 
Impends  ; the  frost  will  gather  round  my  heart ; 

If  the  flowers  wither,  I am  worse  than  dead ! 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH 


415 


Come,  labor,  when  the  worn-out  frame  requires 
Perpetual  Sabbath  ; come  disease  and  want. 

And  sad  exclusion  through  decay  of  sense  ; 

But  leave  me  unabated  trust  in  Thee, 

And  let  Thy  favor,  to  the  end  of  life, 

Inspire  me  with  ability  to  seek 
Repose  and  hope  among  eternal  things, 

Father  of  heaven  and  earth  ! and  I am  rich. 

And  will  possess  my  portion  in  content. 

—Excursion,  Book  I V \ 

THE  ORACULAR  SEA-SHELL. 

I have  seen 

A curious  child,  who  dwelt  upon  a tract 
Of  inland  ground,  applying  to  his  ear 
The  convolutions  of  a smooth-lipped  shell ; 

To  which,  in  silence  hushed,  his  very  soul 
Listened  intensely  ; and  his  countenance  soon 
Brightened  with  joy  ; for  from  within  were  heard 
Murmurings,  whereby  the  monitor  expressed 
Mysterious  union  with  its  native  sea. 

Even  such  a shell  the  universe  itself 
Is  to  the  ear  of  Faith  ; and  there  are  times, 

I doubt  not,  when  to  you  it  doth  impart 
Authentic  tidings  of  invisible  things  ; 

Of  ebb  and  flow,  and  ever-during  Power, 

And  central  peace  subsisting  at  the  heart 
Of  endless  agitation. 

— . Excursion , Book  IV. 

The  Excursion  contains  more  than  9,000  lines< 
Its  special  object  was  to  describe  a visit  to  a re* 
cluse  who,  after  leading  a varied  life,  had  retired 
from  the  world  to  pass  his  last  years  in  this  se- 
questered valley.  The  remainder  of  the  poem 
was  to  consist  of  the  reflections  of  the  recluse 
upon  lofty  topics. 

The  reception  accorded  to  the  Excursion  was 

not  encouraging.  “ This  will  ^ever  do,”  said  Jef- 


416 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH 


frey,  in  the  Edinburgh  Review.  Perhaps  it  was 
well  that  no  more  of  the  meditated  Recluse  was 
ever  written  ; but  none  the  more  did  Wordsworth 
falter  in  carrying  out  the  high  mission  which  he 
held  to  have  devolved  upon  him. 

The  tragedy  The  Borderers , written  as  early  as 
1796,  but  not  published  until  1842,  might  have 
been  destroyed  without  the  world’s  being  the 
poorer.  The  somewhat  extended  narrative  poems 
are  by  no  means  great  works.  We  name  them  in 
the  order  of  their  publication,  which  was  some- 
times several  years  after  their  composition.  The 
White  Doe  of  Rylstone  (1815)  might,  one  would  sup- 
pose, have  been  suggested  by  Scott’s  Lay  of  the 
Last  Minstrel , which  was  published  a couple  of 
years  before  Wordsworth’s  poem  was  written 
Peter  Bell  (1819)  is  barely  saved  from  being  ridic. 
ulous  by  a dozen  vigorous  stanzas  near  the  com- 
mencement. The  Waggoner  (1819)  was  published 
after  lying  in  manuscript  a dozen  years  or  more. 

Among  the  so-called  “minor  poems  ” of  these 
years  there  are  some  which  must  be  regarded  as 
trivial  or  commonplace,  many  which  are  merely 
pretty,  many  that  are  noble,  and  not  a few  which 
will  ever  stand  among  the  grandest  poems  of  the 
world.  A few  of  these  are  here  given,  in  whole 
or  in  part : 

ODE  TO  DUTY. 

Stern  Daughter  of  the  voice  of  God, 

O Duty  ! if  that  name  thou  love, 

Who  art  a light  to  guide,  a rod 
To  check  the  erring  and  reprove, 

Thou  who  art  Victory  and  Law 
When  empty  ^errors  overawe, 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH 


41/ 


From  vain  temptations  dost  set  free, 

And  calm’st  the  weary  strife  of  frail  humanity  I 

There  are  who  ask  not  if  thine  eye 
Be  on  them  ; who,  in  love  and  truth, 

Where  no  misgiving  is,  rely 

Upon  the  genial  sense  of  youth  : 

Glad  hearts,  without  reproach  or  blot, 

Who  do  thy  work  and  know  it  not ; 

Oh  ! if  through  confidence  misplaced, 

They  fail,  thy  saving  arms,  dread  Power ! around  them 
cast. 

Serene  will  be  our  days  and  bright, 

And  happy  will  our  nature  be, 

When  Love  is  an  unerring  light 
And  Joy  its  own  security. 

And  they  a blissful  course  may  hold 
Even  now,  who,  not  unwisely  bold, 

Live  in  the  spirit  of  this  creed  ; 

Yet  seek  thy  firm  support,  according  to  their  need. 

I,  loving  freedom,  and  untried  ; 

No  sport  of  every  random  gust, 

Yet  being  to  myself  a guide, 

Too  blindly  have  reposed  my  trust ; 

And  oft,  when  in  my  heart  was  heard 
Thy  timely  mandate,  I deferred 
The  task,  in  smoother  walks  to  stray  ; 

But  thee  I now  would  serve  more  strictly  if  I may. 

Through  no  disturbance  of  my  soul, 

Or  strong  compunction  in  me  wrought ; 

I supplicate  for  thy  control, 

But  in  the  quietness  of  thought. 

Me  this  unchartered  freedom  tires  ; 

I feel  the  weight  of  chance  desires  ; 

My  hopes  no  more  must  change  their  name, 

I long  for  a repose  that  ever  is  the  same. 

Stern  Lawgiver!  Yet  thou  dost  wear 
The  Godhead's  most  benignant  grace  ; 


4i8 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH 


Nor  know  we  anything  so  fair 
As  is  the  smile  upon  thy  face. 

Flowers  laugh  before  thee  on  their  beds, 

And  fragrance  in  thy  footing  treads ; 

Thou  dost  preserve  the  stars  from  wrong, 

And  the  most  ancient  heavens  through  thee  are  freib 
and  strong. 

To  humbler  functions,  awful  Power, 

I call  thee.  I myself  commend 
Unto  thy  guidance  from  this  hour; 

Oh,  let  my  weakness  have  an  end! 

Give  unto  me,  made  lowly-wise, 

The  spirit  of  self-sacrifice  ; 

The  confidence  of  Reason  give  ; 

And  in  the  light  of  Truth  thy  bondsman  let  me  live. 

ON  THE  POWER  OF  SOUND. 


I. 

Thy  functions  are  ethereal, 

As  if  within  thee  dwelt  a glancing  mind, 

Organ  of  Vision  ! And  a spirit  aerial 
Informs  the  cell  of  Hearing,  dark  and  blind  ; 
Intricate  labyrinth,  more  dread  for  thought 
To  enter  than  oracular  cave  ; 

Strict  passage,  through  which  sighs  are  brought, 
And  whispers  for  the  heart,  their  slave  ; 

And  shrieks,  that  revel  in  abuse 
Of  shivering  flesh  ; and  warbled  air, 

Whose  piercing  sweetness  can  unloose 
The  chains  of  frenzy,  or  entice  a smile 
Into  the  ambush  of  despair  ; 

Hosannas  pealing  down  the  long-drawn  aisle, 
And  requiems  answered  by  the  pulse  that  beat* 
Devoutly,  in  life’s  last  retreats ! . . . 


XI. 

For  terror,  joy,  or  pity, 

Vast  is  the  compass  and  the  swell  of  notes  : 
From  the  babe’s  first  cry  to  voice  of  regal  city. 
Rolling  a solemn,  sea-lik*  bass  that  floats 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH 


419 


Far  as  the  woodlands— with  the  trill  to  blend 
Of  that  shy  songstress,  whose  love-tale 
Might  tempt  an  angel  to  descend, 

While  hovering  o’er  the  moonlight  vale. 

Ye  wandering  Utterances,  has  earth  no  scheme. 

No  scale  of  moral  music — to  unite 
Powers  that  survive  but  in  the  faintest  dream 
Of  memory  ? — Oh,  that  ye  might  stoop  to  bear 
Chains,  such  precious  chains  of  sight 
As  labored  minstrelsies  through  ages  wear ! 

Oh,  for  a balance  fit  the  truth  to  tell 
Of  the  unsubstantial,  pondered  well ! 

XII. 

By  one  pervading  spirit 

Of  tones  and  numbers  all  things  are  controlled, 

As  sages  taught,  where  faith  was  found  to  merit 
Initiation  in  that  mystery  old. 

The  heavens,  whose  aspect  makes  our  mind*  as  still 
As  they  themselves  appear  to  be. 

Innumerable  voices  fill 
With  everlasting  harmony  ; 

The  towering  headlands,  crowned  with  mist, 

Their  feet  among  the  billows,  know 
That  Ocean  is  a mighty  harmonist ; 

Thy  pinions,  universal  Air, 

Ever  waving  to  and  fro, 

Are  delegates  of  harmony  and  bear 

Strains  that  support  the  Seasons  in  their  round ; 

Stern  Winter  loves  a dirge-like  sound. 

XIII. 

Break  forth  into  thanksgiving, 

Ye  banded  instruments  of  wind  and  chords ; 

Unite,  to  magnify  the  Ever-living ; 

Your  inarticulate  notes  with  the  voice  of  words  S 
Nor  hushed  be  service  from  the  lowing  m<??d. 

Nor  mute  the  forest  hum  of  noon  ; 

Thou,  too,  be  heard,  lone  eagle,  freed 
From  snowy  peak  and  cloud,  attune 
Vor.  XXIV— 37 


430  WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH . 

Thy  hungry  barkings  to  the  hymn 
Of  joy,  that  from  her  utmost  walls 
The  six-days’  Work,  by  flaming  Seraphim 
Transmits  to  Heaven ! As  Deep  to  Deep 
Shouting  through  one  valley  calls, 

All  worlds,  all  natures,  mood  and  measure  keep 
For  praise  and  ceaseless  gratulation,  poured 
Into  the  ear  of  God,  their  Lord  I 

XIV. 

A voice  to  Light  gave  Being ; 

To  Time,  and  Man  his  earth-born  chronicler; 

A Voice  shall  finish  doubt  and  dim  foreseeing, 

And  sweep  away  life’s  visionary  stir ; 

The  trumpet  (we,  intoxicate  with  pride, 

Arm  at  its  blast  for  deadly  wars) 

To  archangelic  life  applied, 

The  grave  shall  open,  quench  the  stars. 

O Silence  ! are  Man’s  noisy  years 
No  more  than  moments  of  thy  life  ? 

Is  Harmony,  blest  queen  of  smiles  and  tears, 

With  her  smooth  tones  and  discords  just, 

Tempted  into  rapturous  strife, 

Thy  destined  bond-slave  ? No  ! though  earth  be  dust 
And  vanish  though  the  heavens  dissolve,  her  stay 
Is  in  the  Word  that  shall  not  pass  away. 


INTIMATIONS  OF  IMMORTALITY  FROM  RECOLLECTIONS  OF 
EARLY  CHILDHOOD. 

L 

There  was  a time  when  meadow,  grove,  and  stream. 
The  earth,  and  every  common  sight, 

To  me  did  seem 
Apparelled  in  celestial  light, 

The  glory  and  the  freshness  of  a dream. 

It  is  not  now  as  it  hath  been  of  yore  ; 

Turn  wheresoe’er  I may 
By  night  or  day, 

The  things  which  I have  seen  I now  can  see  no  more 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH 


421 


II. 

i'he  Rainbow  comes  and  goes, 

And  lovely  is  the  Rose, 

The  Moon  doth  with  delight 
Look  round  her  when  the  heavens  are  bare. 

Waters  on  a starry  night 
Are  beautiful  and  fair  ; 

The  sunshine  is  a glorious  birth; 

But  yet  I know,  where’er  I go, 

That  there  hath  passed  away  a glory  from  the  earth. 

in. 

Now,  while  the  birds  thus  sing  a joyous  song, 

And  while  the  young  lambs  bound 
As  to  the  tabor’s  sound, 

To  me  alone  there  came  a thought  of  grief  : 

A timely  utterance  gave  that  thought  relief, 

And  I again  am  strong : 

The  cataracts  blow  their  trumpets  from  the  steep ; 

No  more  shall  grief  of  mine  the  season  wrong  ; 

I hear  the  Echoes  through  the  mountains  throng. 

The  Winds  come  to  me  from  the  fields  of  sleep. 

And  all  earth  is  gay  ; 

Land  and  sea 

Give  themselves  up  to  jollity. 

And  with  the  heart  of  May 
Doth  every  Beast  keep  holiday ; 

Thou  Child  of  Joy, 

Shout  round  me,  let  me  hear  thy  shouts,  thou  happy 
Shepherd-boy  ! 

IV. 

Ye  blessed  Creatures,  I have  heard  the  call 
Ye  to  each  other  make  ; I see 
The  heavens  laugh  with  you  in  your  jubilee. 

My  heart  is  at  your  festival, 

My  head  hath  its  coronal, 

The  fulness  of  your  bliss,  I feel — I feel  it  all. 

Oh  evil  day  ! if  I were  sullen 
While  Earth  herself  is  adorning, 

This  sweet  May-morning, 

And  the  children  are  culling 


422 


WILLIAM  WORDS WvRTH 


On  every  side, 

In  a thousand  valleys  far  and  wide, 

Fresh  bowers  ; while  the  sun  shines  warm 
And  the  Babe  leaps  up  on  his  mother’s  am? : 

I hear,  I hear,  with  joy  I hear ! 

— But  there’s  a Tree,  of  many,  one, 

A single  Field  which  I have  looked  upon, 
Both  of  them  speak  of  something  that  is  gone 
The  Pansy  at  my  feet 
Doth  the  same  tale  repeat : 

Whither  is  fled  the  visionary  gleam  ? 

Where  is  it  now,  the  glory  and  the  dream  * 


v. 

Our  birth  is  but  a sleep  and  a forgetting ; 

The  soul  that  rises  with  us,  our  life’s  Star, 
Hath  had  elsewhere  its  setting, 

And  cometh  from  afar  : 

Not  in  entire  forgetfulness, 

And  not  in  utter  nakedness, 

But  trailing  clouds  of  glory  do  we  come 
From  God,  who  is  our  home  : 

Heaven  lies  about  us  in  our  infancy ! 

Shades  of  the  prison-house  begin  to  close 
Upon  the  growing  Boy, 

But  He  beholds  the  light,  and  whence  it  flows 
He  sees  it  in  his  joy  ; 

The  Youth,  who  daily  farther  from  the  east 
Must  travel,  still  is  Nature’s  Priest, 

And  by  the  vision  splendid 
Is  on  his  way  attended  ; 

At  length  the  Man  perceives  it  die  away, 

And  fade  into  the  light  of  common  day. 

vi. 

Earth  fills  her  lap  with  pleasures  of  her  own  ; 
Yearnings  she  hath  in  her  own  natural  kind, 
And  even  with  something  of  a Mother’s  mind. 
And  no  unworthy  aim, 

The  homely  Nurse  doth  all  she  can 
To  make  her  Foster-child,  her  Inmate  Man, 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH 


Forget  the  glories  he  hath  known, 

And  that  imperial  palace  whence  he  came. 

VIL 

Behold  the  child  among  his  new-born  blisses— 
A six  years’  Darling  of  a pigmy  size  ! 

See  where  'mid  work  of  his  own  hand  he  lies, 
Fretted  by  sallies  of  his  mother’s  kisses, 

With  light  upon  him  from  his  father’s  eyes. 

See,  at  his  feet,  some  little  plan  or  chart. 

Some  fragment  from  his  dream  of  human  life. 
Shaped  by  himself  with  newly  learned  art ! 

A wedding  or  a festival, 

A mourning  or  a funeral, 

And  this  hath  now  his  heart, 

And  unto  this  he  frames  his  song ; 

Then  will  he  fit  his  tongue 
To  dialogues  of  business,  love,  or  strife  ; 

But  it  will  not  be  long 
Ere  this  be  thrown  aside, 

And  with  new  joy  and  pride 
The  little  Actor  cons  another  part ; 

Filling  from  time  to  time  his  “humorous  stage  * 
With  all  the  Persons,  down  to  palsied  Age, 

That  Life  brings  with  her  in  her  equipage. 

As  if  his  whole  vocation 
Were  endless  imitation. 

VIII. 

Thou,  whose  exterior  semblance  doth  belie 
Thy  Soul’s  immensity  ; 

Thou  best  Philosopher,  who  yet  dost  keep 
Thy  heritage,  thou  Eye  among  the  blind, 

That,  deaf  and  silent,  read’st  the  eternal  deep, 
Haunted  forever  by  the  eternal  mind — 

Mighty  Prophet ! Seer  blest  ! 

On  whom  those  truths  do  rest, 

Which  we  are  toiling  all  our  lives  to  find, 

In  darkness  lost,  the  darkness  of  the  grave; 
Thou,  over  whom  thy  Immortality 
Broods  like  the  Day,  a Master  o’er  a Slave, 

A Presence  which  is  not  to  be  put  by  ; 


424 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH 


Thou  little  Child,  yet  glorious  in  the  might 
Of  heaven-born  freedom  on  thy  being’s  height, 
Why  with  such  earnest  pains  dost  thou  provoke 
The  years  to  bring  the  inevitable  yoke, 

Thus  blindly  with  thy  blessedness  at  strife  ? 

Full  soon  thy  soul  shall  have  her  earthly  freight, 
And  custom  lie  upon  thee  with  a weight, 

Heavy  as  frost,  and  deep  almost  as  life ! 


IX. 

O joy  that  in  our  embers 
Is  something  that  doth  live, 

That  nature  yet  remembers 
What  was  so  fugitive  ! 

The  thought  of  our  past  years  in  me  doth  breed 

Perpetual  benediction  : not  indeed 

For  that  which  is  most  worthy  to  be  blest ; 

Delight  and  liberty,  the  simple  creed 
Of  childhood,  whether  busy  or  at  rest, 

With  new-fledged  hopes  still  fluttering  in  his  breast 
Not  for  these  I raise 
The  song  of  thanks  and  praise  ; 

But  for  those  obstinate  questionings, 

Of  sense  and  outward  things, 

Fallings  from  us,  vanishings  ; 

Blank  misgivings  of  a Creature 
Moving  about  in  worlds  not  realized, 

High  instincts  before  which  our  mortal  Nature 
Did  tremble  like  a guilty  thing  surprised : 

But  for  those  first  affections, 

Those  shadowy  recollections, 

Which,  be  they  what  they  may, 

Are  yet  the  fountain-light  of  all  our  day, 

Are  yet  a master-light  of  all  our  seeing  ; 

Uphold  us,  cherish,  and  have  power  to  make 
Our  noisy  years  seem  moments  in  the  being 
Of  the  eternal  Silence  : truths  that  wake 
To  perish  never  ; 

Which  neither  listlessness,  nor  mad  endeavor, 

Nor  Man  nor  Boy, 

Nor  all  that  is  at  enmity  with  joy, 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH 


425 


Cm  utterly  abolish  or  destroy  ! 

Hence  in  a season  of  calm  weather, 

Though  inland  far  we  be, 

Our  souls  have  sight  of  that  immortal  sea 
Which  brought  us  hither, 

Can  in  a moment  travel  thither, 

And  see  the  children  sport  upon  the  shore, 

And  hear  the  mighty  waters  rolling  evermore. 

x. 

Then  sing,  ye  Birds,  sing,  sing  a joyous  song  ! 

And  let  the  young  lambs  bound 
As  to  the  tabor’s  sound  ! 

We  in  thought  will  join  your  throng, 

Ye  that  pipe  and  ye  that  play, 

Ye  that  through  your  hearts  to-day 
Feel  the  gladness  of  the  May  1 
What  though  the  radiance  which  was  once  so  bright 
Be  now  forever  taken  from  my  sight, 

Though  nothing  can  bring  back  the  hour 
Of  splendor  in  the  grass,  of  glory  in  the  flower  ; 

We  will  grieve  not,  rather  find 
Strength  in  what  remains  behind  ; 

In  the  primal  sympathy 

Which  having  been  must  ever  be  ; 

In  the  soothing  thoughts  that  spring 
Out  of  human  suffering  ; 

In  the  faith  that  looks  through  death. 

In  years  that  bring  the  philosophic  mind. 

XI. 

And  O,  ye  Fountains,  Meadows,  Hills,  and  Groves, 
Forebode  not  any  severing  of  our  loves  ! 

Yet  in  my  heart  of  hearts  I feel  your  might; 

I only  have  relinquished  one  delight 
To  live  beneath  your  more  habitual  sway. 

I love  the  brooks  which  down  their  channels  fret. 
Even  more  than  when  I tripped  lightly  as  they  ; 
The  innocent  brightness  of  a new-born  Day 
Is  lovely  yet ; 

The  Clouds  that  gather  round  the  setting  sun 
Do  take  a sober  coloring  from  an  eye 
That  hath  kept  watch  o’er  man’s  mortality ; 


426 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH 


Another  race  hath  been,  and  other  palms  are  won. 

Thanks  to  the  human  heart  by  which  we  live, 

Thanks  to  its  tenderness,  its  joys  and  fears, 

To  me  the  meanest  flower  that  blows  can  give, 
Thoughts  that  do  often  lie  too  deep  for  tears. 

All  of  the  poems  which  we  have  cited  bear  date 
between  1 798  and  1 828 ; that  is,  between  the  twenty- 
eighth  and  the  forty-eighth  years  of  Wordsworth’s 
life,  the  grand  ode  On  the  Power  of  Sound  being 
the  latest  of  them.  The  Intimations  of  Immortal- 
ity was  completed  in  his  thirty-sixth  year.  After 
fifty,  Wordsworth  wrote  little  of  special  note,  al- 
though a few  short  pieces  were  composed  after 
passing  the  age  of  threescore  and  ten.  His  last 
volume,  issued  in  1842,  was  entitled  Poems  Chiefly 
of  Early  and  Late  Years . Throughout  nearly  the 
whole  of  his  career  he  was  fond  of  casting  his 
verse  into  the  restricted  form  of  sonnets.  Of 
these  he  composed  nearly  five  hundred.  Many 
of  them  are  prosaic  in  all  except  form,  but  others 
are  among  the  best  in  our  language. 

THE  SONNET. 

Scorn  not  the  Sonnet ; Critic,  you  have  frowned, 
Mindless  of  its  just  honors  ; with  this  key 
Shakespeare  unlocked  his  heart  ; the  melody 
Of  this  small  lute  gave  ease  to  Petrarch’s  wound ; 

A thousand  times  this  pipe  did  Tasso  sound  : 

With  it  Camoens  soothed  an  exile’s  grief  ; 

The  Sonnet  glittered  a gay  myrtle  leaf 
Amid  the  cypress  with  which  Dante  crowned 
His  visionary  brow  ; a glow-worm  lamp, 

It  cheered  mild  Spenser,  called  from  Fairyland 
To  struggle  through  dark  ways  ; and,  when  a damp 
Fell  round  the  path  of  Milton,  in  his  hand 
The  thing  became  a trumpet ; whence  he  blew 
Soul-animating  strains — alas,  too  few  ! 


WORK,  Henry  Clay,  an  American  song- 
writer, born  in  Middleton,  Conn.,  October  i,  1832 ; 
died  at  Hartford,  Conn.,  June  8,  1884.  In  early 
youth  he  removed  to  Illinois,  but  returned  to  Con- 
necticut in  1845  and  learned  the  printer’s  trade. 
Here  he  wrote  his  first  song,  Were  Coming , Sister 
Mary . In  1855  he  moved  to  Chicago  and  worked 
at  his  trade.  The  Year  of  Jubilee  or  Kingdom 
Coming  was  published  in  1862,  and  his  most  popu- 
lar song,  Marching  Through  Georgia , was  published 
in  1865,  after  Sherman  had  made  his  famous  march 
to  the  sea.  He  wrote,  in  all,  more  than  sixty 
songs,  many  of  which  are  still  very  popular. 

MARCHING  THROUGH  GEORGIA. 

Bring  the  good  old  bugle,  boys,  well  sing  another  song— 
Sing  it  with  a spirit  that  will  start  the  world  along— 
Sing  it  as  we  used  to  sing  it,  fifty  thousand  strong, 
While  we  were  marching  through  Georgia. 

“ Hurrah  ! Hurrah  ! we  bring  the  jubilee ! 

Hurrah  ! Hurrah  ! the  flag  that  makes  you  free  ! ” 
So  we  sang  the  chorus  from  Atlanta  to  the  sea, 

While  we  were  marching  through  Georgia. 

How  the  darkies  shouted  when  they  heard  the  joyful 
sound  ! 

How  the  turkeys  gobbled  which  our  commissary  found ! 
How  the  sweet  potatoes  even  started  from  the  ground, 
While  we  were  marching  through  Georgia. 

(427) 


428  HENRY  CLAY  WORN 

Yes,  and  there  were  Union  men  who  wept  with  joyful 
tears, 

When  they  saw  the  honored  flag  they  had  not  seen  for 
years ; 

Hardly  could  they  be  restrained  from  breaking  forth  in 
cheers, 

While  we  were  marching  through  Georgia. 

“ Sherman's  dashing  Yankee  boys  will  never  reach  the 
coast ! ” 

So  the  saucy  rebels  said,  and  ’twas  a handsome  boast, 
Had  they  not  forgot,  alas  ! to  reckon  with  the  host. 
While  we  were  marching  through  Georgia  ? 

So  we  made  a thoroughfare  for  Freedom  and  her  train, 
Sixty  miles  in  latitude — three  hundred  to  the  main ; 
Treason  fled  before  us,  for  resistance  was  in  vain, 
While  we  were  marching  through  Georgia. 

THE  YEAR  OF  JUBILEE. 

Say,  darkies,  hab  you  seen  de  massa, 

Wid  de  mouffstash  on  he  face, 

Go  ’long  de  road  some  time  this  mornin', 

Like  he  gwine  to  leabe  de  place  ? 

He  see  de  smoke  way  up  de  ribber 
Where  de  Lincum  gun-boats  lay ; 

He  took  he  hat  and  leff  bery  sudden, 

And  I s’pose  he’s  runned  away. 

De  massa  run,  ha  ! ha  I 
De  darkey  stay,  ho  ! ho ! 

It  mus’  be  now  de  kingdum  cornin'. 

An’  de  yar  ob  Jubilo.- 

He  six  foot  one  way  and  two  foot  todder, 

An’  he  weigh  six  hundred  poun' ; 

His  coat  so  big  he  couldn’t  pay  de  tailor. 

An*  it  won’t  reach  half  way  roun' ; 

He  drills  so  much  dey  calls  him  c Vn, 

An’  he  git  so  mighty  tan’d 
I spec  he’ll  try  to  fool  dem  Yr  see S 
For  to  tink  he  contraband 


HENRY  CLAY  WORK 


429 


De  darkies  got  so  lonesome  libb’n 
In  de  log  hut  on  de  lawn, 

Dey  move  dere  tings  into  massa’s  parlor 
For  to  keep  it  while  he  gone. 

Dar’s  wine  and  cider  in  de  kitchin, 

And  de  darkies  dey  hab  some, 

I spec  it  will  all  be  ’fiscated, 

When  de  Lincum  sojers  come. 

De  oberseer,  he  makes  us  trubble. 

An*  he  dribe  us  roun’  a spell, 

We  lock  him  up  in  de  smoke-house  cellar, 
Wid  de  key  flung  in  de  well, 

De  whip  am  lost,  de  han’-cuff  broke. 

But  the  massa  hab  his  pay  ; 

He  big  an’  ole  enough  for  to  know  better 
Dan  to  went  an’  run  away. 

De  massa  run}  ha  ! ha  ! 

De  darkey  stay,  ho ! ho ! 

It  mus’  be  now  de  kingdum  comirA, 

An’  de  yar  ob  Jubilo. 


WOTTON,  Sir  Henry,  an  English  diplomat, 
poet,  and  miscellaneous  writer,  born  at  Bocton  or 
Boughton,  Malherbe,  Kent,  in  1568  ; died  at  Eton 
in  December,  1639.  He  was  educated  at  Win- 
chester and  Oxford,  and  afterward  spent  several 
years  on  the  Continent.  Upon  his  return  he  at- 
tached himself  to  the  Earl  of  Essex,  the  favorite 
of  Queen  Elizabeth.  Upon  the  accession,  in  1603, 
of  James  I.,  to  whom  he  had  already  done  some 
signal  service,  Wotton  was  made  Ambassador  to 
Venice,  where  he  wrote  a tractate  on  The  State  of 
Christendom , which,  however,  was  not  printed  dur- 
ing his  lifetime.  His  own  understanding  of  the 
duties  of  a foreign  ambassador — “ An  honest 
gentleman  sent  to  lie  abroad  for  the  good  of  his 
country  ” — was  in  full  accord  with  the  sentiment 
of  his  time.  About  1618  he  took  holy  orders,  in 
order  to  render  himself  eligible  for  the  position  of 
Provost  of  Eton  College,  which  he  filled  until  his 
death.  In  1624  he  put  forth  a very  creditable  work 
on  The  Elements  of  Architecture . Wotton  was 
rather  a friend  of  letters  and  of  authors  than  dis- 
tinctively an  author.  He  wrote  a warm  eulogium 
on  Milton’s  Comus  (1637),  and  gave  the  poet  some 
sage  advice  upon  his  setting  out  upon  his  travels. 
He  was  also  a friend  of  Izaak  Walton,  with  whom 
he  sometimes  went  a-fishing,  and  who  wrote  his 
Life  and  edited  the  scanty  Reliquice  Wottonia7ice 
(1651).  As  a poet  Wotton  is  known  wholly  by 

C430) 


HENRY  WOTTON 


431 


two  short  pieces,  The  Character  of  a Happy  Life 
(1614),  and  the  piece  beginning-,  “You  meaner 
beauties  of  the  night.”  The  title  given  to  the  latter 
piece,  To  his  Mistress,  Elizabeth , Queen  of  Bohemia,  is 
misleading  to  the  modern  reader.  The  “ Mistress  ” 
celebrated  was  the  excellent  Princess  Elizabeth, 
daughter  of  King  James  L,  for  several  years  the 
wife  of  the  German  Elector  of  the  Palatinate,  who 
in  1619  got  himself  crowned  as  King  of  Bo 
hernia.  His  “ reign  ” lasted  only  six  months,  when 
he  was  ousted  and  driven  into  exile.  It  is  through 
this  six  months’  “ Queen  of  Bohemia  ” that  the 
British  crown  devolved  upon  her  great-grandson 
George  I.,  Elector  of  Hanover. 

TO  HIS  MISTRESS, 

Elizabeth*  Queen  of  Bohemia. 

You  meaner  beauties  of  the  night, 

That  poorly  satisfy  our  eyes 
More  by  your  number  than  your  light ; 

You  common  people  of  the  skies, 

What  are  you  when  the  moon  shall  rise  ? 

You  curious  chanters  of  the  wood, 

That  warble  forth  Dame  Nature’s  lays, 
Thinking  your  passions  understood 

By  your  weak  accents  ! What’s  your  praise 
When  Philomel  her  voice  shall  raise  ? 

You  violets  that  first  appear, 

By  your  pure  purple  mantles  known, 

Like  the  proud  virgins  of  the  year, 

As  if  the  spring  were  all  your  own  ! 

What  are  you  when  the  rose  is  blown  ? 

So,  when  my  Mistress  shall  be  seen 
In  form  and  beauty  of  her  mind— 

By  virtue  first,  then  choice,  a Queen  ! 

Tell  me,  if  she  were  not  designed 

Th’  eclipse  and  glory  of  her  kind  ? 


WYATT,  Sir  Thomas,  an  English  poet,  born 
in  Kent  in  1503  ; died  at  Sherborne,  Dorsetshire, 
October  10,  1542.  His  father  was  Sir  Henry 
Wyatt,  Privy  Councillor  to  Henry  VII.  After 
graduation  at  Cambridge  in  15 18,  Sir  Thomas  was 
an  officer  of  the  household  of  Henry  VIII.,  whose 
good-will  he  was  fortunate  enough  to  retain.  He 
was  knighted  in  1536,  was  High  Sheriff  of  Kent  in 
1537,  and  Ambassador  to  the  Court  of  Charles  V.  in 
1537  and  1539-40.  On  the  fall  of  Lord  Cromwell, 
his  friend,  he  was  falsely  accused,  by  Bishop  Bon- 
ner and  other  enemies,  of  treasonable  correspond- 
ence, but  was  acquitted  after  an  able  speech  in 
self-defence.  His  memoirs  contain  excellent  let- 
ters of  advice  to  his  son,  the  younger  Sir  Thomas, 
who  was  executed  in  1554  for  conspiring  in  favor 
of  Lady  Jane  Grey.  Sir  Thomas,  the  elder,  was 
a man  of  great  learning,  of  ready  wit,  and  of  high 
character.  His  poems,  stilted  to  modern  ears 
and  not  abounding  in  the  poetical  element,  have 
some  very  happy  refrains,  and  here  and  there 
some  remarkable  lines.  The  first  selection  re- 
minds one  of  Tennyson’s  Two  Voices . Like  those 
of  his  friend,  the  Earl  of  Surrey,  Wyatt’s  poems 
are  wholly  free  from  impurity,  a welcome  quality 
not  always  to  be  found  in  poets  of  his  day. 

(43^ 


THOMAS  WYATT 


DESPAIR  COUNSELLETH  THE  DESERTED  LOVER  TO  END  HIS 
WOES  BY  DEATH,  BUT  REASON  BRINGETH  COMFORT. 

Most  wretched  heart ! most  miserable, 

Since  thy  comfort  from  thee  is  fled  ; 

Since  all  thy  truth  is  turned  to  fable, 

Most  wretched  heart  ! why  art  thou  not  dead  ? 

“ No ! no  ! I live  and  must  do  still ; 

Whereof  I thank  God,  and  no  mo  ; 

For  I myself  have  at  my  will, 

And  he  is  wretched  that  weens  him  so.’* 

But  yet  thou  hast  both  had  and  lost 
The  hope  so  long  that  hath  thee  fed, 

And  all  thy  travail,  and  thy  cost ; 

Most  wretched  heart ! why  art  thou  not  dead  ? 

“ Some  pleasant  star  may  show  me  light  ; . . . 

But  though  the  heaven  would  work  me  woe, 

Who  hath  himself  shall  stand  upright ; 

And  he  is  wretched  that  weens  him  so.” 

Hath  he  himself  that  is  not  sure  ? 

His  trust  is  like  as  he  hath  sped. 

Against  the  stream  thou  mayst  not  dure  ; 

Most  wretched  heart ! why  art  thou  not  dead  ? 

“ The  last  is  worst  : who  fears  not  that 
He  hath  himself  whereso  he  go : 

And  he  that  knoweth  what  is  what, 

Saith  he  is  wretched  that  weens  him  so.” 

Seest  thou  not  how  they  whet  their  teeth, 

Which  to  touch  thee  sometime  did  dread  ? 

They  find  comfort,  for  thy  mischief, 

Most  wretched  heart ! why  art  thou  not  dead  ? 

“What  though  that  curse  do  fall  by  kind 
On  him  that  hath  the  overthrow  ; 

All  that  cannot  oppress  my  mind  ; 

For  he  is  wretched  that  weens  him  so.” 

Yet  can  it  not  be  then  denied, 

It  is  as  certain  as  thy  creed, 

Thy  great  unhap  thou  canst  not  hide  ; 

Unhappy  then  I why  art  thou  not  dead  ? 

“ Unhappy  ; but  no  wretch  therefore  l 
For  hap  doth  come  again,  and  go, 

For  which  I keep  myself  in  store ; 

Since  unhap  cannot  kill  me  go.” 


WYSS,  Johann  Rudolfs  a Swiss  poet,  editor, 
and  juvenile  writer,  born  in  Berne,  Switzerland, 
March  13,  1781 ; died  there,  March  31,  1830.  He 
became  Professor  of  Philosophy  in  the  University 
of  Berne  and  Chief  Librarian  of  his  native  town. 
He  edited  Der  Alpenrosen  from  1811  for  about 
twenty  years,  and  for  this  periodical  he  wrote 
many  poems,  chiefly  relating  to  Swiss  history  and 
legend.  He  was  the  author  of  the  great  national 
song  of  Switzerland,  Rufst  du>  mein  Vat er land, 
but  his  title  to  a place  in  the  hearts  of  the  boys 
and  girls  of  every  nation  must  rest  upon  a book 
whose  fame  the  world  over  has  been  second  only 
to  that  of  De  Foe’s  Robinson  Crusoe — The  Swiss 
Family  Robinson  (1813).  This  book  was  begun  by 
his  father,  but  was  left  in  a very  crude  and  un- 
satisfactory state,  and  to  the  subject  of  this  sketch 
the  credit  of  its  authorship  really  belongs.  The 
Swiss  Family  Robinson  has  been  translated  into 
every  European  language,  and  has  gone  through 
hundreds  of  editions.  In  1815  Wyss  published 
Idyls , Traditions , Legends , and  Tales  of  Switzerland 
— a most  delightful  and  valuable  book. 

SHIPWRECK  AND  RESCUE. 

The  tempest  had  raged  for  six  days,  and  on  the  sev- 
enth seemed  to  increase.  The  ship  had  been  so  far 
driven  from  its  course,  that  no  one  on  board  knew  where 
wc  were.  Everyone  was  exhausted  with  fatigue  and 

Utt) 


JOHANN  RUDOLF  IVYSS 


435 


Watching.  The  shattered  vessel  began  to  leak  in  many 
places,  the  oaths  of  the  sailors  were  changed  to  pray- 
ers, and  each  thought  only  how  to  save  his  own  life. 
“ Children,”  said  I,  to  my  terrified  boys,  who  were 
clinging  round  me,  “God  can  save  us  if  He  will.  To 
Him  nothing  is  impossible  ; but  if  He  thinks  it  good  to 
call  us  to  Him,  let  us  not  murmur : we  shall  not  be  sep- 
arated.” My  excellent  wife  dried  her  tears,  and  from 
that  moment  became  more  tranquil.  We  knelt  down 
to  pray  for  the  help  of  our  Heavenly  Father ; and  the 
fervor  and  emotion  of  my  innocent  boys  proved  to  me 
that  even  children  can  pray,  and  find  in  prayer  conso- 
lation and  peace. 

We  rose  from  our  knees  strengthened  to  bear  the 
afflictions  that  hung  over  us.  Suddenly  we  heard  amid 
the  roaring  of  the  waves  the  cry  of  “ Land  ! land  ! ” 
At  that  moment  the  ship  struck  on  a rock  ; the  concus- 
sion threw  us  down.  We  heard  a loud  cracking,  as  if 
the  vessel  were  parting  asunder ; we  felt  that  we  were 
aground,  and  heard  the  captain  cry,  in  a tone  of  despair, 
" We  are  lost ! Launch  the  boats ! ” These  words  were 
a dagger  to  my  heart,  and  the  lamentations  of  my 
children  were  louder  than  ever.  I then  recollected  my- 
self, and  said,  “ Courage,  my  darlings,  we  are  still  above 
water,  and  the  land  is  near.  God  helps  those  who  trust 
in  Him.  Remain  here,  and  I will  endeavor  to  save  us.” 

I went  on  deck,  and  was  instantly  thrown  down,  and 
wet  through  by  a huge  sea  ; a second  followed.  I 
struggled  boldly  with  the  waves,  and  succeeded  in  keep- 
ing myself  up,  when  I saw,  with  terror,  the  extent  of 
our  wretchedness.  The  shattered  vessel  was  almost  in 
two  ; the  crew  had  crowded  into  the  boats,  and  the  last 
sailor  was  cutting  the  rope.  I cried  out,  and  prayed 
them  < o take  us  with  them  ; but  my  voice  was  drowned 
m the  roar  of  the  tempest,  nor  could  they  have  returned 
for  us  through  waves  that  ran  mountains  high.  All  hope 
from  their  assistance  was  lost  ; but  I was  consoled  by 
observing  that  the  water  did  not  enter  the  ship  above  a 
certain  height.  The  stern,  under  which  lay  the  cabin 
which  contained  all  that  was  dear  to  me  on  earth,  was 
immovably  fixed  between  two  rocks.  At  the  same  time 
X observed,  toward  the  south,  traces  of  land,  whi;  I 
Vol.  XXIV— a8 


43$ 


JOHANN  RUDOLF  WYSS 


though  wild  and  barren,  was  now  the  haven  of  my  al- 
most expiring  hopes,  no  longer  being  able  to  depend 
on  any  human  aid.  I returned  to  my  family,  and  en- 
deavored to  appear  calm.  “ Take  courage,”  cried  I, 
“there  is  yet  hope  for  us;  the  vessel,  in  striking  be- 
tween the  rocks,  is  fixed  in  a position  which  protects 
our  cabin  above  the  water,  and  if  the  wind  should  settle 
to-morrow,  we  may  possibly  reach  the  land.”  . . . 

“ Let  us  leap  into  the  sea,” cried  Fritz,  “and  swim  to 
the  shore.” 

“Very  well  for  you,”  replied  Ernest,  “who  can 
swim,  but  we  should  be  all  drowned.  Would  it  not  be 
better  to  construct  a raft,  and  go  all  together  ?” 

“ That  might  do,”  added  I,  “ if  we  were  strong 
enough  for  such  a work,  and  if  a raft  were  not  always  so 
dangerous  a conveyance.  But  away,  boys,  look  about 
you,  and  seek  for  anything  that  may  be  useful  to  us.” 


Cried  Jack  : “ Put  us  each  into  a great  tub,  and  let 
us  float  to  shore.  I remember  sailing  capitally  that 
way  on  godpapa’s  great  pond  at  S .” 

“A  very  good  idea,  Jack  ; good  counsel  may  some- 
times be  given,  even  by  a child.  Be  quick,  boys,  give  me 
the  saw  and  auger,  with  some  nails  ; we  will  see  what 
we  can  do.”  I remembered  seeing  some  empty  casks  in 
the  hold.  We  went  down,  and  found  them  floating. 
This  gave  us  less  difficulty  in  getting  them  upon  the 
lower  deck,  which  was  just  above  the  water.  They  were 
of  strong  wood,  bound  with  iron  hoops,  and  exactly 
suited  my  purpose  ; my  sons  and  I therefore  began  to 
saw  them  through  the  middle.  After  long  labor,  we 
had  eight  tubs,  all  the  same  height.  We  refreshed  our- 
selves with  wine  and  biscuit,  which  we  had  fc  and  in 
some  of  the  casks.  I then  contemplated  with  Jelight 
my  little  squadron  of  boats,  ranged  in  a line,  and  was 
surprised  that  my  wife  still  continued  depressed.  She 
looked  mournfully  on  them.  “ I can  never  venture  in 
one  of  these  tubs,”  said  she. 

“ Wait  a little,  till  my  work  is  finished,”  replied  I, 
“ and  you  will  see  it  is  more  to  be  depended  on  thaa 
this  broken  vessel.” 


JOHANN  RUDOLF  IVVSS 


437 


I sought  out  a long,  flexible  plank,  and  arranged  the 
eight  tubs  on  it,  close  to  each  other,  leaving  a piece  at 
each  end  to  form  a curve  upward,  like  the  keel  of  a 
vessel.  We  then  nailed  them  firmly  to  the  plank,  and 
to  each  other.  We  nailed  a plank  at  each  side,  of  the 
same  length  as  the  first,  and  succeeded  in  producing  a 
sort  of  boat,  divided  into  eight  compartments,  in  which 
it  did  not  appear  difficult  to  make  a short  voyage,  over 
a calm  sea. 

But,  unluckily,  our  wonderful  vessel  proved  so  heavy 
that  our  united  efforts  could  not  move  it  an  inch.  I 
sent  Fritz  to  bring  me  the  jack-screw,  and,  in  the  mean- 
time, sawed  a thick,  round  pole  into  pieces  : then  raising 
the  fore  part  of  our  work  by  means  of  the  powerful 
machine,  Fritz  placed  one  of  these  rollers  under  it. 

I quickly  proceeded  to  tie  a strong  cord  to  the  after 
part  of  it,  and  the  other  end  to  a beam  in  the  ship, 
which  was  still  firm,  leaving  it  long  enough  for  secur- 
ity ; then  introducing  two  more  rollers  underneath,  and 
working  with  the  jack,  we  succeeded  in  launching  our 
bark,  which  passed  into  the  water  with  such  velocity, 
that  but  for  our  rope  it  would  have  gone  out  to  sea. 
Unfortunately,  it  leaned  so  much  on  one  side  that  none 
of  the  boys  would  venture  into  it.  I was  in  despair, 
when  I suddenly  remembered  it  only  wanted  ballast  to 
keep  it  in  equilibrium.  I hastily  threw  in  anything  I 
got  hold  of  that  was  heavy,  and  soon  had  my  boat 
level,  and  ready  for  occupation.  They  now  contended 
who  should  enter  first,  but  I stopped  them,  reflecting 
that  these  restless  children  might  easily  capsize  our 
vessel.  I remembered  that  savage  nations  made  use  of 
an  out-rigger,  to  prevent  their  canoe  oversetting,  and 
this  I determined  to  add  to  my  work.  I fixed  two  por- 
tions of  a topsail-yard,  one  over  the  prow,  the  other 
across  the  stern,  in  such  a manner  that  they  should  not 
be  in  the  way  in  pushing  off  our  boat  from  the  wreck. 
I forced  the  end  of  each  yard  into  the  bung-hole  of  an 
empty  brandy-cask,  to  keep  them  steady  during  our 
progress.  When  all  was  ready,  we  implored  the  bless- 
ing of  God  on  our  undertaking,  and  prepared  to  embark 
in  our  tubs.  We  waited  a little  for  my  wife,  who  came 
loaded  with  a large  bag,  which  she  threw  into  the  tub 


438 


JOHANN  RUDOLF  IVYSS 


that  contained  her  youngest  son.  I concluded  it  was 
intended  to  steady  him,  or  for  a seat,  and  made  no  ob- 
servation on  it.  The  tide  was  rising  when  we  left, 
which  I considered  might  assist  my  weak  endeavors. 
We  turned  our  out-riggers  lengthwise,  and  thus  passed 
from  the  cleft  of  the  ship  into  the  open  sea.  We  rowed 
with  all  our  might,  to  reach  the  blue  land  we  saw  at  a 
distance,  but  for  some  time  in  vain,  as  the  boat  kept 
turning  round,  and  made  no  progress.  At  last  I con- 
trived to  steer  it,  so  that  we  went  straight  forward. 

We  proceeded  slowly,  but  safely.  At  length  we  saw, 
near  the  mouth  of  a rivulet,  a little  creek  between 
the  rocks,  toward  which  our  geese  and  ducks  made, 
serving  us  for  guides.  This  opening  formed  a little 
bay  of  smooth  water,  just  deep  enough  for  our  boat. 
I cautiously  entered  it,  and  landed  at  a place  where  the 
coast  was  about  the  height  of  our  tubs,  and  the  water 
deep  enough  to  let  us  approach.  All  that  were  abl® 
leaped  on  shore  in  a moment.  Even  little  Francis,  who 
had  been  laid  down  in  his  tub  like  a salted  herring, 
tried  to  crawl  out,  but  was  compelled  to  wait  for  his 
mother’s  assistance.  Our  first  care,  when  we  stepped 
in  safety  on  land,  was  to  kneel  down  and  thank  God, 
to  whom  we  owed  our  lives,  and  to  resign  ourselves 
wholly  to  His  fatherly  kindness. — Swiss  Family  Robinson. 


W5§ 

XENOPHON,  a Grecian  soldier  and  historian, 
born  at  Athens,  probably  about  43 1 B.c. ; died,  prob- 
ably at  Corinth,  about  341  B.c.  He  was  of  good 
family  and  moderate  estate,  and  became  in  youth  a 
pupil  of  Socrates.  Diogenes  Laertius,  in  his  Life 
of  Xenophon,  tells  a pretty  story  of  the  origin  of  this 
pupilship.  Socrates  one  day  encountered  Xeno- 
phon, “ a beautiful,  modest  boy,”  in  a narrow  pas- 
sage, put  his  stick  across  so  as  to  stop  him,  and 
asked  him,  “ Where  can  provisions  be  bought  ? ” 
Xenophon  named  a place.  “ And  where  are  men 
made  noble  and  good  ? ” inquired  Socrates.  Xen- 
ophon knew  no  such  place.  “Well,  then,”  said 
Socrates,  “ follow  me  and  learn.”  At  all  events, 
Xenophon  was  often  present  at  the  informal  les- 
sons of  Socrates,  and  took  down  notes  of  his  talk, 
which  he  long  afterward  wrote  out  in  Memorabilia 
of  Socrates.  Xenophon  grew  up  to  early  manhood 
during  the  long  Peloponnesian  War,  so  graphically 
described  by  Thucydides.  That  over,  at  about 
thirty  he  joined  the  Greek  “ Ten  Thousand,”  who 
aided  Cyrus  (called  “ the  Younger,”  to  distinguish 
him  from  Cyrus  the  Great)  in  his  disastrous  at- 
tempt to  wrest  the  Persian  sceptre  from  the  hands 
of  his  elder  brother  Artaxerxes.  The  story  of 
this  expedition,  occupying  a space  of  just  two 
years,  is  told  in  the  Anabasis  of  Xenophon,  by  far 
the  most  important  of  his  many  works.  Cyrus 
was  defeated  and  killed  at  the  battle  of  Cunaxa, 

(439) 


440 


XENOPHON 


near  Babylon  (401  B.c.).  His  Asiatic  forces  were 
cut  to  pieces  or  dispersed,  and  the  Grecian  Ten 
Thousand  undertook  the  long  and  perilous  retreat 
through  the  mountains  of  Armenia  from  the  banks 
of  the  Euphrates  to  the  shores  of  the  Euxine. 
Xenophon  was  one  of  the  highest  in  command, 
and  to  him  mainly  was  owing  the  successful  issue 
of  the  retreat.  He  subsequently  took  up  his  resi- 
dence at  Scillus,  a little  town  of  Elis,  under  Spar- 
tan protection,  where  he  lived  for  some  forty 
years,  occupying  himself,  says  his  biographer,  “ in 
farming  and  hunting,  feasting  his  friends,  and 
writing  his  histories.” 

Diogenes  Laertius,  who  lived  in  our  second 
century,  gives  a list  of  fifteen  works  composed  by 
Xenophon,  all  of  which  are  still  extant.  They 
comprise  the  Anabasis,  the  Cyropcedia , the  Memora- 
bilia, the  Hellenics , and  small  essays  on  domestic 
economy,  hunting,  horsemanship,  and  the  like. 
In  respect  of  style,  the  Greek  of  Xenophon  may 
be  compared  with  the  English  of  Addison  ; and 
the  Cyropcedia  and  the  Anabasis  are  among  the 
first  books  put  into  the  hands  of  young  students 
of  the  language.  The  following  extract  is  from 
near  the  close  of  the  Anabasis . When  the  Ten 
Thousand — or  rather  the  six  thousand  remaining 
of  them — had  reached  a place  of  safety,  they  called 
their  commanders  to  account  for  several  misdeeds 
alleged  against  them.  Xenophon  thus  describes 
the  scene : 

Xenophon’s  exculpation  of  himself. 

Some  also  brought  accusations  against  Xenophon, 
alleging  that  they  had  been  beaten  by  him,  and  charg- 


XENOrHON 


4*x 


ing  him  with  having  behaved  insolently.  On  this,  Xen- 
ophon stood  up,  and  called  on  him  who  had  spoken  first 
to  say  where  he  had  been  beaten.  He  answered : 
“When  we  were  perishing  with  cold,  and  when  the 
snow  was  deepest.”  Xenophon  rejoined,  “ Come,  come  ; 
in  such  severe  weather  as  you  mention,  when  provi- 
sions had  failed  and  we  had  not  wine  so  much  as  to  smell 
of — when  many  were  exhausted  with  fatigue,  and  the 
enemy  were  close  behind — if  at  such  a time  I behaved 
insolently,  I acknowledge  that  I must  be  more  vicious 
than  an  ass,  which,  they  say,  is  too  vicious  to  feel  being 
tired.  Tell  us,  however,  why  you  were  beaten.  Did  I 
ask  for  anything,  and  beat  you  when  you  would  not 
give  it  me  ? Did  I ask  anything  back  from  you  ? Was 
I quarrelling  about  a love  affair  ? Did  I maltreat  you 
in  my  cups  ? ” 

As  the  man  said  that  there  was  nothing  of  the  kind, 
Xenophon  asked  him  whether  he  was  one  of  the  heavy- 
armed troops  ? He  answered,  “ No.”  Whether  he  was 
a targeteer  ? He  said  that  he  was  not  either,  but  a free 
man,  who  had  been  set  to  drive  a mule  by  his  comrades. 
On  this  Xenophon  recognized  him,  and  asked  him, 
“ What  1 are  you  the  man  who  was  conveying  the  sick 
person  ? ” “Aye,  by  Jupiter,  I am,”  said  he,  “ for  you  com- 
pelled me  to  do  it ; and  you  scattered  about  the  baggage 
of  my  comrades.”  “ The  scattering,”  rejoined  Xenophon, 
“ was  something  in  this  way  : I distributed  it  to  others 
to  carry,  and  ordered  them  to  bring  it  to  me  again  ; 
and  having  got  it  all  back,  I restored  it  all  safe  to  you 
as  soon  as  you  had  produced  the  man  that  I gave  you 
in  charge.  But  hear,  all  of  you,”  he  continued,  “ in 
what  way  the  affair  happened,  for  it  is  worth  listening 
to.  A man  was  being  left  behind  because  he  was  able 
to  march  no  farther.  I knew  nothing  of  the  man  ex  - 
cept that  he  was  one  of  us.  And  I compelled  you,  sir, 
to  bring  him,  that  he  might  not  perish  ; for,  if  I mistake 
not,  the  enemy  was  pressing  upon  us.” 

This  the  complainant  acknowledged.  “Well,  then,” 
said  Xenophon,  “ after  I had  sent  you  on,  did  I not  catch 
you,  as  I came  up  with  the  rear-guard,  digging  a trench 
to  bury  the  man,  when  I stopped  and  commended  you  ? 
But  while  we  were  standing  by,  the  man  drew  up  his 


442 


XENOPHON 


leg,  and  those  who  were  there  cried  out  that  he  was 
alive  ; and  you  said,  1 He  may  be  as  much  alive  as  he 
likes,  for  I sha’n’t  carry  him.’  On  this  I struck  you,  it 
is  quite  true  ; for  you  seemed  to  me  to  have  been  aware 
that  the  man  was  alive.”  “Well,  then,”  explained  the 
other,  “ did  he  die  any  the  less  after  I had  rendered  him 
up  to  you  ?”  “ Why,  we  shall  all  die,”  said  Xenophon  ; 

“ but  is  that  any  reason  that  we  should  be  buried  alive  ? ” 

Hereupon  all  the  assembly  cried  out  that  Xenophon 
had  not  beaten  the  fellow  half  enough.  And  this  com- 
plaint having  been  disposed  of,  no  others  were  brought 
against  Xenophon,  who  addressed  the  soldiers,  saying : 

“ I acknowledge  to  have  struck  many  men  for  breach 
of  discipline — men  who  were  content  to  owe  their  pres- 
ervation to  your  orderly  march  and  constant  fighting, 
while  they  themselves  left  the  ranks  and  ran  on  before, 
so  as  to  have  an  advantage  over  you  in  looting.  Had  we 
all  acted  as  they  did,  we  should  have  perished  to  a man. 
Sometimes,  too,  I struck  men  who  were  lagging  behind 
with  cold  and  fatigue,  or  were  stopping  the  way  so  as  to 
hinder  others  from  getting  forward.  I struck  them  with 
my  fist,  in  order  to  prevent  them  from  being  struck  with 
the  lance  of  the  enemy.  It  is  a plain  case.  If  I punished 
anyone  for  his  good,  I claim  the  privilege  of  parents 
with  their  children,  masters  with  their  scholars,  and  sur- 
geons with  their  patients.  In  the  time  of  storm  the  cap- 
tain must  be  rough  with  his  men,  for  the  least  mistake 
is  fatal.  But  this  is  all  over  now  ; the  calm  has  come. 
And  since  I strike  nobody  now,  when  by  the  favor  of 
the  gods  I am  in  good  spirits,  and  am  no  longer  de- 
pressed with  cold,  hunger,  and  fatigue,  and  now  that  I 
have  more  wine  to  drink,  you  may  see  that  it  was  at  all 
events  not  through  insolence  that  I struck  anyone  be- 
fore. If  such  things  are  to  be  brought  up  against  me,  I 
would  ask,  in  common  fairness,  that  some  of  you  stand 
up  on  the  other  side,  and  recall  a few  of  the  occasions 
on  which  I have  helped  you  against  the  cold,  or  against 
the  enemy,  or  when  sick  or  in  distress.” 

Xenophon  says : “ All  was  right  in  the  end.” 
He  was  not  merely  acquitted,  but  stood  the  higher 


XENOPHON* 


443 


!n  the  esteem  of  his  men.  The  Cyropcedia , the  “ Ed- 
ncation  of  Cyrus  ” the  Great — not  the  Cyrus  of  the 
Anabasis — is  not  to  be  regarded  as  a history  ; it  is 
a romance  setting  forth  the  training  of  a great 
prince,  not  merely  in  childhood  and  youth,  but 
through  a long  and  varied  career,  down  to  his 
death  at  an  advanced  age.  There  are  a few  points 
of  resemblance  between  the  Cyrus  of  Xenophon’s 
romance  and  the  Cyrus  of  history.  Both  were, 
indeed,  great  monarchs,  conquerors  of  Babylonia 
and  Asia  Minor.  But  the  historical  Cyrus  was 
slain  in  a battle  with  the  Scythians  near  the  Cas- 
pian ; while  the  Cyrus  of  the  romance  died  at  a 
ripe  old  age  in  his  palace,  surrounded  by  his  chil- 
dren, and  with  a discourse  upon  immortality  upon 
his  lips. 


THE  DEATH  OF  CYRUS  THE  GREAT. 

“ I have  realized  ” (said  Cyrus  to  his  sons)  “ all  that 
is  most  highly  prized  in  the  successive  ages  of  life— as 
a child  in  childhood,  as  a young  man  in  youth,  as  a man 
in  maturity.  My  strength  has  seemed  to  increase  with 
the  advance  of  time  ; I have  failed  in  nothing  that  I 
undertook.  I have  exalted  my  friends  and  humbled 
my  enemies,  and  have  brought  my  country  from  ob° 
scurity  to  the  summit  of  glory.  I have  kept  hitherto 
from  anything  like  boasting,  knowing  that  a reverse 
might  come  ; but  now  that  the  end  has  arrived,  I may 
safely  claim  to  have  been  fortunate.  . . . 

“You  cannot  surely  believe  that  when  I have  ended 
this  mortal  life  I shall  cease  to  exist.  Even  in  lifetime 
you  have  never  seen  my  soul ; you  have  only  inferred 
its  existence.  And  there  are  grounds  for  inferring  the 
existence  of  the  soul  after  death.  Have  we  not  seen 
what  a power  is  exercised  by  the  souls  of  murdered 
men  after  death— how  they  send  avenging  Furies  to 
punish  their  murderers  ? It  is  only  to  this  belief  in  the 


444 


XENOPHON 


power  of  the  soul  after  death  that  the  custom  of  paying 
honor  to  the  dead  is  due ; and  the  belief  is  reasonable, 
for  the  soul,  and  not  the  body,  is  the  principle  of  life. 
When  the  soul  and  body  are  separated,  it  is  natural  to 
think  that  the  soul  will  live.  And  the  soul,  too,  is  the 
principle  of  intelligence.  When  severed  from  the  sense- 
less body  it  will  not  surely  lose  its  intelligence,  but  only 
become  more  pure  and  bright;  just  as  in  sleep,  when 
the  soul  is  most  independent  of  the  body,  it  seems  to 
gain  the  power,  by  prophetic  dreams,  of  seeing  into 
futurity. 

“ Do,  then,  what  I advise,  from  a regard  to  my  immor- 
tal spirit.  But  if  I be  mistaken  in  thinking  it  so,  then 
act  out  of  regard  for  the  eternal  gods,  who  maintain  the 
order  of  the  universe,  and  watch  over  piety  and  justice. 
Respect,  too,  humanity  in  its  perpetual  succession,  and 
act  so  as  to  be  approved  by  all  posterity.  When  I am 
dead,  do  not  enshrine  my  body  in  gold  or  silver,  but  re- 
store it  to  the  earth ; for  what  can  be  better  than  to  be 
mixed  up  and  incorporated  with  the  beneficent  source 
of  all  that  is  good  for  men  ? 

While  life,  which  still  lingers  in  me,  remains,  you 
may  come  near  and  touch  my  hand,  and  look  upon  my 
face ; but  when  you  have  covered  my  head  for  death,  I 
request  that  no  man  may  any  more  look  upon  my  body. 
But  summon  all  the  Persians  and  the  allies  to  my  tomb, 
to  rejoice  with  me  that  I shall  now  be  in  safety,  and 
cannot  suffer  evil  any  more,  whether  I shall  have  gone 
to  the  gods,  or  whether  I shall  have  ceased  to  exist. 
Distribute  gifts  among  all  who  come.  And  remember 
this,  my  last  word  of  advice:  By  doing  good  to  your 

friends,  you  will  gain  the  power  of  punishing  your  ene- 
mies. Farewell,  dear  children!  Say  farewell  to  your 
mother  from  me.  All  my  friends,  absent  as  well  as 
present,  farewell ! ” 

Having  said  this,  and  taken  everyone  by  the  right 
hand,  he  covered  his  face  and  expired. — Cyropcedia. 


YATES,  Edmund  Hodgson,  an  English  jour- 
nalist and  novelist,  born  in  1831;  died  May  20, 
1894.  He  received  a good  education,  and  for 
many  years  was  chief  of  the  missing-letter  depart- 
ment in  the  post-office  of  London,  but  resigned 
in  1872  to  devote  himself  to  authorship.  He  lect- 
ured in  the  United  States  in  1873,  and  afterward 
became  the  London  representative  of  the  New 
York  Herald . In  1874  he  established  the  London 
World , of  which  he  was  the  editor.  His  books 
are  My  Haunts  and  Their  Frequenters  (1854) ; After 
Office  Honrs  (1 861)  ; Broken  to  Harness  ( 1 864) ; Pages 
in  Waiting  (1865);  Running  the  Gauntlet  (1865); 
Kissing  the  Rod  (1866) ; Land  at  Last  (18 66) ; Black 
Sheep  (1867);  Wrecked  in  Port  (1869);  Dr.  Wain - 
wright's  Patient  (1871);  Nobody's  Fortune  (1871); 
The  Yellow  Flag  (1873);  The  Lmpending  Sword 
(1874) ; Personal  Reminiscences  and  Experiences , Fifty 
Years  of  London  Life , and  Memoirs  of  a Man  of  the 
World.  Mr.  Yates  also  wrote  several  dramas  and 
memoirs,  besides  contributions  to  periodicals  and 
newspaper  articles. 

“The  work  which  Edmund  Yates  leaves  behind 
him,  under  his  name,”  says  Arthur  Waugh,  “is 
but  a small  part  of  his  achievement.  He  wrote 
several  successful  works,  a play  or  so,  some  vol- 
umes of  essays,  and  an  admirable  and  genial  biog- 
raphy; but  the  strength  of  his  influence  was  not 


446  EDMUND  HODGSON  YATES 

here.  His  claim  to  respect  mainly  lay  in  the  fact 
that  he  was  the  father  of  modern  journalism. 
When,  years  ago,  he  was  crossed  off  the  books  of 
the  Garrick  Club  for  writing  a descriptive  article 
which  gave  offence  to  Thackeray,  he  laid  the 
foundation,  for  better  or  worse,  of  the  new  school 
of  personal  literature.  That  article  is  far  less  of 
an  outrage  on  good  taste  than  the  ordinary  jour^ 
nalism  which  passes  current  nowadays : had 

Thackeray  been  living  to-day,  he  would  have 
been  voted  absurd  for  his  annoyance.  But  Ed- 
mund Yates  was  the  pioneer  of  literary  photog- 
raphy, and,  like  all  pioneers,  he  paid  the  penalty.” 

DR.  PRATER. 

Not  to  be  known  to  Dr.  Prater  was  to  confess  that 
the  “ pleasure  of  your  acquaintance  ” was  of  little  value  ; 
for  assuredly,  had  it  been  worth  anything,  Dr.  Prater 
would  have  had  it  by  hook  or  by  crook.  A wonderful  man, 
Dr.  Prater,  who  had  risen  from  nothing,  as  his  detract- 
ors said  ; but  however  that  might  be,  he  had  a practice 
scarcely  excelled  by  any  in  London.  Heart  and  lungs 
were  Dr.  Prater’s  specialties;  and  persons  imagining 
themselves  afflicted  in  those  regions,  came  from  all 
parts  of  England,  and  thronged  the  doctor’s  dining-room 
in  Queen-Anne  Street  in  the  early  forenoons,  vainly 
pretending  to  read  Darwin  On  the  Fertilization  of  Orchids, 
the  Life  of  Captain  Hedley  Vicars , or  the  Supplement  of 
yesterday’s  Times , and  furtively  glancing  round  at  the 
other  occupants  of  the  room,  and  wondering  what  was 
the  matter  with  them.  That  dining-room  looked  rather 
different  about  a dozen  times  in  the  season,  of  an  even- 
ing, when  the  books  were  cleared  away,  and  the  big 
bronze  gas-chandelier  lighted,  and  the  doctor  sat  at  the 
large,  round  table  surrounded  by  a dozen  of  the  pleasant- 
est people  in  London. 

Such  a mixture  1 Never  was  such  a man  for  “bring- 


EDMUND  NODGSON  YATES 


447 


ing  people  together  *’  as  Dr.  Prater.  The  manager  of 
the  Italian  Opera  (Dr.  Prater’s  name  was  to  all  the 
sick-certificates  for  singers)  would  be  seated  next  to  a 
judge,  who  would  have  a leading  member  of  the  Jockey 
Club  on  his  other  hand,  and  a bishop  for  his  vis-ct-vis. 
Next  the  bishop  would  be  a cotton-lord,  next  to  him  the 
artist  of  a comic  periodical,  and  next  to  him  a rising 
member  of  the  Opposition,  with  an  Indian  colonel  and 
an  American  comedian,  here  on  a starring  engagement, 
in  juxtaposition.  The  dinner  was  always  good,  the  wines 
were  excellent,  and  the  doctor  was  the  life  and  soul  of  the 
party.  He  had  something  special  to  say  to  everyone  : 
and  as  his  big,  protruding  eyes  shone  and  glimmered 
through  his  gold-rimmed  spectacles,  he  looked  like  a 
convivial  little  owl.  A very  different  man  over  the 
dinner-table  to  the  smug  little,  pale-faced  man  in  black 
whom  wretched  patients  found  in  the  morning  sitting 
behind  a leather-covered  table,  on  which  a stethoscope 
was  conspicuously  displayed,  and  who,  after  sounding 
the  chests  of  consumptive  curates  or  struggling  clerks, 
would  say,  with  an  air  of  blandness,  dashed  with  sor- 
row : “ I’m  afraid  the  proverbially  treacherous  air  of 
our  climate  will  not  do  for  us,  my  dear  sir!  I’m  afraid 
we  must  spend  our  winter  at  Madeira,  or  at  least  at 
Pau.  Good  day  to  you ; ” and  then  the  doctor,  after 
shaking  hands  with  his  patient,  would  slip  the  tips  of 
his  fingers  into  his  trousers-pockets,  into  which  would 
fall  another  little  paper  package  to  join  a number  al- 
ready there  deposited,  while  the  curate  or  clerk,  whose 
yearly  income  was  perhaps  two  hundred  pounds,  and 
who  probably  had  debts  amounting  to  twice  his  annual 
earnings,  would  go  away  wondering  whether  it  was  bet- 
ter to  endeavor  to  borrow  the  further  sum  necessary,  at 
ruinous  interest,  or  to  go  back  and  die  in  the  cold  Lin- 
colnshire clay  parish,  or  in  the  bleak  Northern  city,  as 
the  case  might  be. 

On  one  thing  the  doctor  prided  himself  greatly,  that 
he  never  let  a patient  know  what  he  thought  of  him. 
He  would  bid  a man  remove  his  waistcoat  with  a semi- 
jocund  air,  and  the  next  instant  listen  to  a peculiar 
“click  ” inside  his  frame,  which  betrayed  the  presence 
of  heart-disease,  liable  at  any  moment  to  carrv  the  man 


448 


EDMUND  HODGSON  YATES 


off,  without  altering  a muscle  of  his  face  or  a tone  of 
his  voice. 

“ Hum  ! ha  ! we  must  be  a little  careful ; we  must 
not  expose  ourselves  to  the  night-air  ! Take  a leetle 
more  care  of  yourself,  my  dear  sir  ; for  instance,  I would 
wear  a wrap  round  the  throat — some  wrap  you  know, 
to  prevent  the  cold  striking  to  the  part  affected.  Send 
this  to  Bell’s  and  get  it  made  up,  and  take  it  three  times 
a day  ; and  let  me  see  you  on — on  Saturday.  Good  day 
to  you.”  And  there  would  not  be  the  smallest  quiver 
in  the  hard  metallic  voice,  or  the  smallest  twinkle  in  the 
observant  eye  behind  the  gold-rimmed  glasses,  although 
the  doctor  knew  that  the  demon  Consumption,  by  his 
buffet,  had  raised  that  red  spot  on  the  sufferer’s  cheek, 
and  was  rapidly  eating  away  his  vitality. 

But  if  Dr.  Prater  kept  a strict  reticence  to  his  patients 
as  regarded  their  own  ailments,  he  was  never  so  happy 
as  when  enlarging  to  them  on  the  diseases  of  their  fel- 
low-sufferers, or  of  informing  esoteric  circles  of  the 
special  varieties  of  disorder  with  which  his  practice  led 
him  to  cope.  “ You  ill,  my  dear  sir  ! ” he  would  say  to 
some  puny  specimen  ; then,  settling  himself  into  his 
waistcoat  after  examination,  “you  complain  of  narrow- 
chestedness — why,  my  dear  sir,  do  you  know  Sir 
Hawker  de  la  Crache  ? You’ve  a pectoral  development 
which  is  perfectly  surprising  when  contrasted  with  Sir 
Hawker’s.  But  then  he,  poor  man ! last  stage — Ma- 
deira no  good — would  sit  up  all  night  playing  whist  at 
Reid’s  hotel.  Algiers  no  good — too  much  brandy,  to- 
bacco, and  baccarat  with  French  officers — nothing  any 
good.  You , my  dear  sir,  compared  to  Sir  Hawker — 
pooh,  nonsense  ! ” Or  in  any  other  form  : “ Any  such 
case,  my  dear  madam  ? — any  such  case  ?” — turning  to  a 
large  book,  having  previously  consulted  a small  index 
— “a  hundred  such  i Here,  for  instance,  Lady  Susan 
Bray,  now  staying  at  Ventnor,  living  entirely  on  asses’- 
milk — in  some  of  our  conditions  we  must  live  on  asses’- 
milk — left  lung  quite  gone,  life  hanging  by  a thread. 
You’re  a Juno,  ma’am,  in  comparison  to  Lady  Susan  ! ” 
There  was  no  mistake,  however,  about  the  doctor’s 
talent  ; men  in  his  own  profession,  who  sneered  at  his 
charlatanerie  of  manner,  allowed  that  he  was  thoroughly 


EDMUND  HODGSON  YATES 


449 


well  versed  in  his  subject.  He  was  very  fond  of  young 
men’s  society  ; and,  with  all  his  engagements,  always 
found  time  to  dine  occasionally  with  the  Guards  at 
Windsor,  with  a City  company  or  two,  or  with  a snug 
set  en  petit  comitd  in  Temple  chambers,  and  to  visit  the 
behind-scenes  of  two  or  three  theatres,  the  receptions 
of  certain  great  ladies,  and  occasionally  the  meetings  of 
the  Flybynights  Club.  To  the  latter  he  always  came 
in  a special  suit  of  clothes  on  account  of  the  impregna- 
tion of  tobacco-smoke  ; and  when  coming  thither  he 
left  his  carriage  and  his  address,  in  case  he  was  required, 
at  the  Minerva,  with  orders  to  fetch  him  at  once.  It 
would  never  have  done  for  some  of  his  patients  to  know 
that  he  was  a member  of  the  Flybynights. — Broken  to 
Harness . 


YONGE,  Charlotte  Mary,  an  English  novel- 
ist, bora  at  Hants  in  1823;  died  at  Winchester, 
England,  on  March  24th,  1901.  The  daughter  of 
W.  C.  Yonge,  a magistrate  of  Hants,  she  early  de- 
voted herself  to  literature.  Her  books  were  writ- 
ten for  the  instruction  and  amusement  of  the 
young,  and  to  enforce  healthy  morals.  She  was 
editor  of  the  Monthly  Packet , a High  Church  peri- 
odical. Her  works  have  gone  through  many  edi- 
tions. The  proceeds  of  her  best-known  book, 
The  Heir  of  Redclyffe  (1853),  were  devoted  to  the 
equipment  of  the  missionary  schooner  Southern 
Cross , for  the  use  of  Bishop  Selwyn,  and  the 
profits  of  The  Daisy  Chain  (£2,006)  she  gave 
toward  the  erection  of  a missionary  college  at 
Auckland,  New  Zealand.  Among  her  many 
works  are  Abbey-Church , or  Self-control  and  Self- 
conduct  (1844)  ; Scenes  and  Characters  (1847)  i Lang- 
ley-School  (1848);  Kenneth  (1850);  The  Kings  of 
England  (1851);  The  Two  Guardians  (1852);  Land- 
marks of  History  (185  2-84) ; Heartsease  (1854);  The 
Lances  of  Lynwood  (1855);  Leonard,  the  Lion-Heart 
(1856);  The  Christmas  Mummers  (1858);  The  Trial: 
More  Links  of  the  Daisy  Chain  (1864);  The  Clever 
Woman  of  the  Family  (1865) ; The  Dove  in  the  Eagle's 
Nest  (1866);  Cameos  from  English  History  (1868); 
The  Chaplet  of  Pearls  (1868) ; The  Caged  Lion  (1870) ; 
A Parallel  History  of  France  and  England  (1871); 
Eighteen  Centuries  of  Beginnings  of  Church  History 


CHARLOTTE  MARY  YONGE  45 i 

(18  76);  Love  and  Life  (188c);  Lads  and  Lasses  of 
Langley  (x88 1) ; Historical  Ballads;  Stray  Pearls . 
Memoirs  of  Margaret  de  Ribaumont  (1883) ; Langley 
Adventures  (1884);  Two  Sides  of  the  Shield  (1885) ; 
A Modern  Telemachus  (1886);  Under  the  Storm 
(1887);  Life  of  Scott  (1888);  Life  of  Hannah  More 
(1888);  Our  New  Mistress  (1888);  The  Slaves  of 
Sabinus  (1890).  She  has  also  edited  and  translated 
a number  of  books,  including  Catherine  of  Ara- 
gon and  The  Sources  of  the  Reformation , from  the 
French  of  Du  Bois(i88i);  The  Reputed  Changeling 
(1890);  Two  Penniless  Princesses  (1891);  The  Con- 
stables Tower  (1891);  More  By-zvords  (1891);  That 
Stick  (1892) ; The  Cross  Roads  (1892) ; Grisley  Grisell 
(1893)  ; An  Old  Woman  s Oiitlook  (1893) ; The  Treas- 
ures in  the  Marshes  (1893);  The  Rubies  of  St.  Lo 
(1894);  A Long  Vacation  (1895). 

THE  CLEVER  WOMAN. 

Rachel  had  had  the  palm  of  cleverness  conceded  to 
her  ever  since  she  could  recollect,  when  she  read  better 
at  three  years  old  than  her  sister  at  five,  and  ever  after, 
through  the  days  of  education,  had  enjoyed,  and  ex- 
ceeded in,  the  studies  that  were  a toil  to  Grace. 

Subsequently,  while  Grace  had  contented  herself  with 
the  ordinary  course  of  unambitious  feminine  life,  Rachel 
had  thrown  herself  into  the  process  of  self-education 
with  all  her  natural  energy,  and  carried  on  her  favorite 
studies  by  every  means  within  her  reach,  until  she  con- 
siderably surpassed  in  acquirements  and  reflection  all 
the  persons  with  whom  she  came  in  frequent  contact. 
It  was  a homely  neighborhood,  a society  well  born,  but 
of  circumscribed  interests  and  habits,  and  little  con- 
nected with  the  great  progressive  world,  where,  how- 
ever, Rachel’s  sympathies  all  lay,  necessarily  fed,  how- 
ever, by  periodical  literature,  instead  of  by  conversation 
or  commerce  with  living  minds. 

Vol.  XXIV.—  29 


452  CHARLOTTE  MARY  YONCE 

She  began  by  being  stranded  on  the  ignorance  of 
those  who  surrounded  her,  and  found  herself  isolated  as 
a sort  of  pedant  ; and  as  time  went  on,  the  narrowness 
of  interests  chafed  her,  and  in  like  manner  left  her 
alone.  As  she  grew  past  girlhood,  the  cui  bono  question 
had  come  to  interfere  with  her  ardor  in  study  for  its 
own  sake,  and  she  felt  the  influence  of  an  age  eminently 
practical  and  sifting,  but  with  small  powers  of  acting. 

The  quiet  Lady  Bountiful  duties  that  had  sufficed  her 
mother  and  sister  were  too  small  and  easy  to  satisfy  a 
soul  burning  at  the  report  of  the  great  cry  going  up  to 
heaven  from  a world  of  sin  and  woe. 

The  examples  of  successful  workers  stimulated  her 
longings  to  be  up  and  doing,  and  yet  the  ever  difficult 
question  between  charitable  works  and  filial  deference 
necessarily  detained  her,  and  perhaps  all  the  more  be- 
cause it  was  not  so  much  the  fear  of  her  mother’s  au- 
thority as  of  her  horror  and  despair  that  withheld  her 
from  the  decisive  and  eccentric  steps  that  she  was 
always  feeling  impelled  to  take. 

Gentle  Mrs.  Curtis  had  never  been  a visible  power  in 
her  house,  and  it  was  through  their  desire  to  avoid 
paining  her  that  her  government  had  been  exercised 
over  her  two  daughters  ever  since  their  father’s  death, 
which  had  taken  place  in  Grace’s  seventeenth  year. 

Both  she  and  Grace  implicitly  accepted  Rachel’s 
superiority  as  an  unquestionable  fact,  and  the  mother, 
when  traversing  any  of  her  clever  daughter’s  schemes, 
never  disputed  either  her  opinions  or  principles,  only 
entreating  that  these  particular  developments  might  be 
conceded  to  her  own  weakness ; and  Rachel  generally 
did  concede. 

She  could  not  act ; but  she  could  talk  uncontradicted, 
and  she  hated  herself  for  the  enforced  submission  to 
a state  of  things  that  she  despised. — The  Clever  Woman 
of  the  Family . 


YOUNG,  Edward,  an  eminent  English  poet, 
courtier,  and  clergyman,  born  at  Upham,  near 
Winchester,  in  1681  ; died  at  Welwyn,  Hertford- 
shire, April  12,  1765.  His  father  was  rector  of 
Upham,  in  Hampshire,  when  his  son  was  born, 
but  subsequently  became  Dean  of  Salisbury. 
The  son  was  educated  at  Winchester  School, 
and  at  All  Souls’  College,  Oxford.  In  1712  he 
commenced  his  career  as  poet  and  courtier,  one 
of  his  patrons  being  the  notorious  Duke  of  Whar- 
ton, who  brought  him  forward  as  a candidate  for 
Parliament,  giving  a bond  for  ^600  to  defray  the 
election  expenses.  Young  was  defeated  ; Whar- 
ton died,  and  the  Court  of  Chancery  decided 
that  the  bond  was  invalid.  In  1725  Young  put 
forth  his  vigorous  satire,  The  Universal  Passion — 
the  Love  of  Fame , and  a pension  of  £200  was 
granted  to  him,  which  he  continued  to  receive 
during  the  remaining  forty  years  of  his  life.  Up 
to  forty-five  Young  lived  the  life  of  a wit,  man 
about  town,  and  place-hunter,  the  last  with  indif- 
ferent success.  He  now  resolved  upon  a change  ; 
took  orders  in  the  Anglican  Church,  and  was 
presented  by  his  college  to  the  living  of  Welwyn 
in  Hertfordshire,  wrote  a panegyric  upon  King 
George  II.,  and  received  the  honorary  dignity  of 
one  of  the  chaplains  to  his  Majesty.  He  hoped 
for  ecclesiastical  preferment,  and  vainly  sought 


454 


EDWARD  YOUNG 


to  obtain  a bishopric.  In  1761,  when  he  was 
verging  upon  fourscore,  he  was  made  Clerk  of 
the  Closet  to  the  dowager  Princess  of  Wales,  the 
mother  of  George  III.,  who  had  just  acceded  tc 
the  throne.  When  past  fifty  Young  married 
Mrs.  Lee,  the  widowed  daughter  of  the  Earl  of 
Lichfield.  By  her  former  husband  she  had  two 
sons,  to  whom  Young  was  tenderly  attached. 
The  young  men  and  their  mother  died  at  no 
great  intervals — though  not  within  three  months, 
as  suggested  by  Young;  there  was  a space  of 
more  than  four  years  between  the  death  of  the 
first  son  and  that  of  their  mother.  The  threefold 
bereavement  was  the  occasion  of  the  composition 
of  the  Nigkt  Thoughts , the  first  portion  of  which 
was  published  in  1742,  the  last  in  1744.  Young’s 
poetical  works  include  panegyrics,  odes,  and  epis- 
tles; several  satires,  the  best  of  which  is  The 
Universal  Passion  ; a few  dramatic  pieces,  the  best 
of  which  is  the  tragedy  of  Revenge ; and  the 
Night  Thoughts , to  which  may  be  fairly  assigned 
the  first  place  among  the  strictly  religious  didac- 
tic poems  in  our  language. 

PROCRASTINATION. 

Be  wise  to-day  ; ’tis  madness  to  defer ; 

Next  day  the  fatal  precedent  will  plead ; 

Thus  on,  till  wisdom  is  pushed  out  of  life. 
Procrastination  is  the  thief  of  time  ; 

Year  after  year  it  steals,  till  all  are  fled, 

And  to  the  mercies  of  a moment  leaves 
The  vast  concerns  of  an  eternal  scene. 

Of  man’s  miraculous  mistakes  this  bears 
The  palm,  “ That  all  men  are  about  to  live.” 
Forever  on  the  brink  of  being  born. 


EDWARD  YOUNG 


455 


All  pay  themselves  the  compliment  to  think 
They  one  day  shall  not  drivel : and  their  pride 
On  this  reversion  takes  up  ready  praise  : 

At  least  their  own  ; their  future  selves  applaud: 

How  excellent  that  life  they  ne’er  will  lead  ! 

Time  lodged  in  their  own  hands  is  Folly’s  veils  ; 

That  lodged  in  Fate’s  to  wisdom  they  consign  ; 

The  thing  they  can’t  but  purpose  they  postpone  : 

’Tis  not  in  folly  not  to  scorn  a fool, 

And  scarce  in  human  wisdom  to  do  more. 

All  promise  is  poor,  dilatory  man, 

And  that  through  every  stage.  When  young,  indeed, 
In  full  content  we  sometimes  nobly  rest, 

Unanxious  for  ourselves,  and  only  wish, 

As  duteous  sons,  our  fathers  were  more  wise. 

At  thirty  a man  suspects  himself  a fool ; 

Knows  it  at  forty,  and  reforms  his  plan  ; 

At  fifty  chides  his  infamous  delay, 

Pushes  his  prudent  purpose  to  resolve  ; 

In  all  the  magnanimity  of  thought 
Resolves,  and  re-resolves  ; then  dies  the  same. 

And  why  ? Because  he  thinks  himself  immortal. 

All  men  think  all  men  mortal  but  themselves ; 
Themselves,  when  some  alarming  shock  of  fate 
Strikes  through  their  wounded  hearts  the  sudden  dread  ; 
But  their  hearts  wounded,  like  the  wounded  air, 

Soon  close  ; where  passed  the  shaft  no  trace  is  found. 
As  from  the  wing  no  scar  the  sky  retains, 

The  parted  wave  no  furrow  from  the  keel, 

So  dies  in  human  hearts  the  thought  of  death  ; 

Even  with  the  tender  tears  which  Nature  sheds 
O’er  those  we  love,  we  drop  it  in  their  grave. 

THE  LAPSE  OF  TIME — MAN. 

The  bell  strikes  one.  We  take  no  note  of  time 
Save  by  its  loss  : to  give  it  then  a tongue 
Is  wise  in  man.  As  if  an  angel  spoke, 

I feel  the  solemn  sound.  If  heard  aright, 

It  is  the  knell  of  my  departed  hours. 

Where  are  they  ? With  the  years  beyond  the  flood. 

It  is  the  signal  that  demands  despatch  : 


456 


EDWARD  YOUNG 


How  much  is  to  be  done  ! My  hopes  and  fears 
Start  up  alarmed,  and  o’er  life’s  narrow  verge 
Look  down — on  what  ? A fathomless  abyss  ; 

A dread  Eternity  ! how  surely  mine ! 

And  can  Eternity  belong  to  me, 

Poor  pensioner  upon  the  bounties  of  an  hour! 

How  poor,  how  rich,  how  abject,  how  august, 

How  complicate,  how  wonderful  is  Man  ! 

How  passing  wonder  He  who  made  him  such ! 

Who  centred  in  our  make  such  strange  extremes  ! 
From  different  natures  marvellously  mixed, 
Connection  exquisite  of  distant  worlds! 

Distinguished  link  in  Being’s  endless  chain, 

Midway  from  Nothing  to  the  Deity  ! 

A beam  ethereal,  sullied  and  absorpt ! 

Though  sullied  and  dishonored,  still  divine  ! 

Dim  miniature  of  greatness  absolute  ! 

An  heir  of  glory ! a frail  child  of  dust  ! 

Helpless  immortal  ! insect  infinite ! 

A worm ! a god  ! — I tremble  at  myself. 

And  in  myself  am  lost.  At  home  a stranger, 
Thought  wanders  up  and  down,  surprised,  aghast, 
And  wondering  at  her  own.  How  reason  reels  ! 

Oh  ! what  a miracle  to  man  is  Man ! 

Triumphantly  distressed  ! what  joy  ! what  dread  ! 
Alternately  transported  and  alarmed  ! 

What  can  preserve  my  life  ? or  what  destroy  ? 

An  angel’s  arm  can’t  snatch  me  from  the  grave ; 
Legions  of  angels  can’t  confine  me  there ! 

— Night  Thoughts , Night  /. 

ETERNITY. 

Time  the  supreme  ! — Time  is  eternity, 

Pregnant  with  all  eternity  can  give  ; 

Pregnant  with  all  that  makes  archangels  smile. 
Who  murders  time,  he  crushes  in  the  birth 
A power  ethereal,  only  not  adored. 

Ah  ! hew  unjust  to  nature  and  himself, 

Is  thoughtless,  thankless,  inconsistent  man  ! 

Like  children  babbling  nonsense  in  their  sports, 
We  censure  nature  for  a span  too  short ; 


EDWARD  YOUNG 


457 


That  span  too  short,  we  tax  as  tedious,  too ; 

Torture  invention,  all  expedients  tire, 

To  lash  the  lingering  moments  into  speed, 

And  whirl  us  (happy  riddance  !)  from  ourselves. 

Art,  brainless  art ! our  furious  charioteer 
(For  nature’s  voice,  unstifled,  would  recall) 

Drives  headlong  toward  the  precipice  of  death  ! 

Death,  most  our  dread  ; death,  thus  more  dreadful 
made : 

Oh,  what  a riddle  of  absurdity  ! 

Leisure  is  pain  ; takes  off  our  chariot-wheels : 

How  heavily  we  drag  the  load  of  life  ! 

Blessed  leisure  is  our  curse  : like  that  of  Cain, 

It  makes  us  wander  ; wander  earth  around 
To  fly  that  tyrant,  thought.  As  Atlas  groaned 
The  world  beneath,  we  groan  beneath  an  hour. 

We  cry  for  mercy  to  the  next  amusement : 

The  next  amusement  mortgages  our  fields  ; 

Slight  inconvenience  ! prisons  hardly  frown, 

From  hateful  time  if  prisons  set  us  free. 

Yet  when  Death  kindly  tenders  us  relief, 

We  call  him  cruel ; years  to  moments  shrink, 

Ages  to  years.  The  telescope  is  turned. 

To  man’s  false  optics  (from  his  folly  false) 

Time,  in  advance,  behind  him  hides  his  wings, 

And  seems  to  creep,  decrepit  with  his  age  ; 

Behold  him  when  passed  by  ; what,  then,  is  seen 
But  his  broad  pinions,  swifter  than  the  winds ; 

And  all  mankind,  in  contradiction  strong, 

Rueful,  aghast ! cry  out  on  his  career. 


Ye  well  arrayed  ! ye  lilies  of  our  land! 

Ye  lilies  male ! who  neither  toil  nor  spin 
(As  sister  lilies  might) ; if  not  so  wise 
As  Solomon,  more  sumptuous  to  the  sight ! 

Ye  delicate  ; who  nothing  can  support, 
Yourselves  most  insupportable  ! for  whom 
The  winter  rose  must  blow,  the  sun  put  on 
A brighter  beam  in  Leo  ; silky-soft 
Favonius  ! breathe  still  softer,  or  be  chid  ; 
And  other  worlds  send  odors,  sauce,  and  song, 


458 


EDWARt)  YOUNG 


And  robes,  and  notions,  framed  in  foreign  looms  ’ 

O ye  Lorenzos  of  our  age  ! who  deem 

One  moment  unamused  a misery 

Not  made  for  feeble  man ! who  call  aloud 

For  every  bawble  drivelled  o’er  by  sense ; 

For  rattles  and  conceits  of  every  cast, 

For  change  of  follies  and  relays  of  joy, 

To  drag  you  patient  through  the  tedious  length 
Of  a short  winter’s  day — say,  sages  ! say, 

Wit’s  oracles  ! say,  dreamers  of  gay  dreams  ! 

How  will  you  weather  an  eternal  night 
Where  such  expedients  fail  ? 

THE  IMMORTAL  AND  THE  MORTAL  LIFE. 

E’en  silent  Night  proclaims  my  soul  immortal ; 

E’en  silent  Night  proclaims  eternal  Day  ; 

For  human  weal  Heaven  husbands  all  events. 

Dull  Sleep  instructs,  nor  sport  vain  Dreams  in  vain. 
Why  then  their  loss  deplore  that  are  not  lost  ? 

Why  wanders  wretched  Thought  their  tombs  around 
In  infidel  distress  ? Are  angels  there  ? 

Slumbers — raked  up  in  dust — ethereal  fire  ? 

They  live,  they  greatly  live  ; a life  on  earth 
Unkindled,  unconceived  ; and  from  an  eye 
Of  tenderness  let  heavenly  pity  fall 
On  me,  more  justly  numbered  with  the  dead. 

This  is  the  desert,  this  the  solitude. 

How  populous,  how  vital  is  the  gravel 
This  is  creation’s  melancholy  vault, 

The  vale  funereal,  the  sad  cypress  gloom  ; 

The  land  of  apparitions,  empty  shades  ! 

All,  all  on  earth  is  shadow  ; all  beyond 
Is  substance  ; the  reverse  is  folly’s  creed  : 

How  solid  all  where  change  shall  be  no  more! 

This  is  the  bud  of  being,  the  dim  dawn, 

The  twilight  of  our  day,  the  vestibule. 

Life’s  theatre  as  yet  is  shut,  and  Death — 

Strong  Death,  alone  can  heave  the  massive  bar— 
This  gross  impediment  of  clay  remove — 

And  make  us,  embryos  of  existence,  free 
For  real  life.  But  little  more  remote 


EDWARD  YOUNG 


459 


Is  he~not  yet  a candidate  for  light — 

The  future  embryo,  slumbering  in  his  sire. 

Embryos  we  must  be  till  we  burst  the  shell — 

Yon  ambient  azure  shell — and  spring  to  life, 

The  life  of  gods,  O transport  ! and  of  Man. 

Yet  man,  fool  man  ! here  buries  all  his  thoughts, 
Inters  celestial  hopes  without  one  sigh. 

Prisoners  of  earth,  and  pent  beneath  the  moon, 

Here  pinions  all  his  wishes  ; winged  by  Heaven 
To  fly  at  infinite  ; and  reach  it  there 
Where  seraphs  gather  immortality, 

On  Life’s  fair  tree  fast  by  the  throne  of  God. 

What  golden  joys  ambrosial  clustering  glow 
In  His  full  beam,  and  ripen  for  the  just, 

Where  momentary  ages  are  no  more ! 

Where  Time  and  Pain  and  Chance  and  Death  expire  ! 

And  is  it  in  the  flight  of  threescore  years 
To  push  Eternity  from  human  thought, 

And  smother  souls  immortal  in  the  dust? — 

A soul  immortal,  spending  all  her  fires, 

Wasting  her  strength  in  strenuous  idleness; 

Thrown  into  tumult,  raptured  or  alarmed, 

At  aught  this  scene  can  threaten  or  indulge, 
Resembles  ocean  into  tempest  wrought, 

To  waft  a feather,  or  to  drown  a fly. 

— Night  Thoughts , Night  L 


ZANGWILL,  Israel,  an  English  novelist,  born 
in  1864.  He  received  his  early  education  at  the 
Jewish  Free  School,  London,  and  became  a teach- 
er in  that  institution.  His  ambition,  however,  was 
in  the  field  of  literature  and  journalism,  and  after 
teaching  for  two  or  three  years  he  accepted  a posi- 
tion on  the  Ariel , a small  comic  publication.  He 
then  went  on  the  Jewish  Standard,  contributing 
personal  and  editorial  paragraphs  over  the  signa- 
ture of  “ Marshallik.”  During  his  connection  with 
the  Standard  he  became  acquainted  with  the 
wealthier  class  of  his  co-religionists.  He  was 
witty  at  everybody’s  expense,  and  his  satire  was 
merciless.  After  several  years  he  severed  his 
connection  with  the  Standard,  which  was  soon 
thereafter  discontinued.  He  was  associated  with 
Harry  Quilter  on  the  Universal,  and  also  with 
Jerome  K.  Jerome  on  the  Idler . His  chief  repu- 
tation, however,  rests  upon  his  novels,  his  first  be- 
ing The  Children  of  the  Ghetto,  a fine  exposition  of 
the  character  of  the  London  Jew.  This  was  fol- 
lowed by  The  Grandchildren  of  the  Ghetto.  He  has 
also  produced  The  Bachelors  Club  (1891);  The  Big 
Bow  Mystery  (1891);  The  Old  Maids  Club  (1892); 
The  King  of  Schnorrers  (1893) ; The  Master , a not- 
able success  (1895),  and  Cleo  the  Magnificent ; or 
The  Muse  of  the  Real  ( 1 898). 

-C46o) 


ISRAEL  ZAN-GWILL 


461 


THE  DEATH  OF  BENJY  ANSELL. 

Coleman  was  deeply  perturbed.  He  was  wondering 
whether  he  should  plead  guilty  to  a little  knowledge, 
when  a change  of  expression  came  over  the  wan  face 
on  the  pillow.  The  doctor  came  and  felt  the  boy’s 
pulse. 

“No,  I don’t  want  to  hear  that  ‘ Maaseh ,’  ” cried  Ben- 
jamin. “Tell  me  about  the  Sambatyon,  father,  which 
refuses  to  flow  on  Shabbos.” 

He  spoke  Yiddish,  grown  a child  again.  Moses’s 
face  lit  up  with  joy.  His  eldest  born  had  returned  to 
intelligibility.  There  was  hope  still,  then.  A sudden 
burst  of  sunshine  flooded  the  room.  In  London  the 
sun  would  not  break  through  the  clouds  for  some  hours. 
Moses  leaned  over  the  pillow,  his  face  working  with 
blended  emotions.  He  let  a hot  tear  fall  on  his  boy’s 
upturned  face. 

“ Hush,  hush,  my  little  Benjamin,  don’t  cry,”  said 
Benjamin,  and  began  to  sing,  in  his  mother’s  jargon  : 

“ Sleep,  little  father,  sleep, 

Thy  father  shall  be  a Rov, 

Thy  mother  shall  bring  little  apples, 

Blessings  on  thy  little  head.” 

Moses  saw  his  dead  Gittel  lulling  his  boy  to  sleep. 
Blinded  by  his  tears,  he  did  not  see  that  they  were  fall- 
ing thick  upon  the  little  white  face. 

“ Nay,  dry  thy  tears,  I tell  thee,  my  little  Benjamin,” 
said  Benjamin,  in  tones  more  tender  and  soothing,  and 
launched  into  the  strange  wailing  melody  : 

“ Alas,  woe  is  me  ! 

How  wretched  to  be 
Driven  away  and  banished, 

Yet  so  young,  from  thee.” 

“ And  Joseph’s  mother  called  to  him  from  the  grave : 
Be  comforted,  my  son,  a great  future  shall  be  thine.” 

“ The  end  is  near,”  Old  Four-Eyes  whispered  to  the 
father  in  jargon. 


462 


ISRAEL  ZANGWILL 


Moses  trembled  from  head  to  foot.  “ My  poor  lamb ! 
My  poor  Benjamin/*  he  wailed.  “ I thought  thou 
wouldst  say  Kaddish  after  me,  not  I for  thee.”  Then 
he  began  to  recite  quietly  the  Hebrew  prayers.  The 
hat  he  should  have  removed  was  appropriate  enough 
now. 

Benjamin  sat  up  excitedly  in  bed  : “ There’s  Mother, 
Esther!  ” he  cried  in  English.  “Coming back  with  my 
coat.  But  what’s  the  use  of  it  now  ? ” 

His  head  fell  back  again.  Presently  a look  of  yearn- 
ing came  over  the  face  so  full  of  boyish  beauty.  “ Esther,” 
he  said,  “wouldn’t  you  like  to  be  in  the  green  country 
to-day  ? Look  how  the  sun  shines  ! ” 

It  shone  indeed,  with  deceptive  warmth,  bathing  in 
gold  the  green  country  that  stretched  beyond,  and  daz- 
zling the  eyes  of  the  dying  boy.  The  birds  twittered 
outside  the  window. 

“Esther,”  he  said  wistfully,  “do  you  think  there’ll  be 
another  funeral  soon  ?” 

The  matron  burst  into  tears  and  turned  away- 

“ Benjamin,”  cried  the  father,  frantically,  think^g  the 
end  had  come,  “ say  the  Shemang!1 

The  boy  stared  at  him,  a clearer  look  in  his  eye*. 

“ Say  the  Shemang  ! ” said  Moses,  peremptorily.  The 
word  Shemang , the  old,  authoritative  tone,  penetrated 
the  consciousness  of  the  dying  boy. 

“ Yes,  father,  I was  just  going  to,”  he  grumbled,  sub- 
missively. 

They  repeated  the  last  declaration  of  the  dying  Israel- 
ite together.  It  was  in  Hebrew.  “ Hear,  O Israel,  the 
Lord  our  God,  the  Lord  is  one.”  Both  understood  that. 

Benjamin  lingered  on  a few  more  minutes,  and  died 
in  a painless  torpor. 

“ He  is  dead,”  said  the  doctor. 

“Blessed  be  the  true  J^dge,”  said  Moses.  He  rent 
his  coat  and  closed  the  staring  eyes.  Then  he  went  to 
the  toilet-table  and  turned  the  looking-glass  to  the  wall, 
and  opened  the  window  and  emptied  the  jug  of  water 
upon  the  green,  sunlit  grass. — Childreii  of  the  Ghetto  r 


hi  mm 

OF  TIE 

pivfRHiry  fFHUWto 


EMILE  ZOLA. 


ZOLA,  Emile,  a noted  French  novelist  and 
dramatist,  born  in  Paris  on  the  2d  of  April,  1840; 
died  on  the  29th  of  September,  1902.  His  par- 
ents soon  removed  to  Aix,  where  his  father,  an 
engineer  of  reputation,  was  employed  on  the  con- 
struction of  the  canal  which  still  bears  his  name. 
In  1858  Zola  returned  to  Paris,  studied  at  the 
Lycee  St.  Louis,  and  obtained  employment  in  the 
publishing  house  of  Hachette  & Co.,  with  which  he 
remained  connected  until  1865.  In  1898  his  name 
was  brought  into  prominence  through  his  connection 
with  the  celebrated  Dreyfus  case.  As  a result  of 
the  defence  of  the  captain  he  was  sentenced  to  im- 
prisonment, and  fined  3,000  francs.  His  first  book, 
Conf°s  a Ninon , appeared  in  1864.  He  then  re- 
solved to  devote  himself  to  authorship,  and  put 
forth  in  rapid  succession  La  Confession  de  Claude 
(1865) ; Vceu  d'une  Morte  (1866) ; Mes  Haines , a col- 
lection of  literary  and  artistic  conversations 
(1866);  Les  My  stives  de  Marseille , Manet , and  The- 
rise  Raquin  (1867),  and  Madeleine  Fdat  (1868).  His 
series  of  romances,  Les  Rougon  Macquart,  Histoire 
Naturelle  et  So  dale  d'  une  Famille  sous  le  Second  Em- 
pire, in  which  he  turns  all  the  mud  of  human 
nature  to  the  sun,  comprises  La  Fortune  des 
Rougon  (1871);  La  Curd  (1874);  La  Conquete  de 
Plassans  (1874) ; L A ssommoir  (1874-77);  Le  Ventre 
de  Paris  (1875)  ; La  Faute  de  VAbbi  Mouret  (1875); 
Son  Excellence  Eugene  Rougon  (1876);  Une  Pagt 


464 


EMILE  ZOLA 


d' Amour  (1878);  Nana  (1880) ; Pot-Bouille  (1882); 
Au  Bonheur  des  Dames  (1883);  La  Joie  de  Vivre 
(1884)  ; Germinal , L GZuvre,  La  Terre  (1 887),  and  Le 
Rive  (1888),  the  last-mentioned  book  being  so  un- 
like the  others  that  it  has  been  called  “ a snow- 
drop among  weeds.”  Zola  has  dramatized  Thi- 
rise  Raquin , and  has  published  two  other  dramas, 
Les  Heritiers  Rabourdin  and  Le  Bouton  de  Rose. 
His  critical  works,  Le  Roman  Expirimental  and  Le 
Naturalisme  au  Thidtre , give  his  theory  of  the 
sphere  of  romance  and  the  drama.  His  later 
works  include  La  Bete  Humaine  (1890);  L Argent 
(1891) ; La  de  Bdele  (1892) ; Le  Docteur  Pascal  (1893) ; 
Lourdes  (1894)  ; Rome  (1895)  ; Paris  (1898). 


A WAIF  IN  THE  STORM. 

During  the  hard  winter  of  i860  the  Oise  froze,  deep 
snows  covered  the  plains  of  lower  Picardy,  and  on 
Christmas  Day  a sudden  storm  from  the  Northeast 
almost  buried  Beaumont.  The  snow  began  to  fall  in 
the  morning,  fell  twice  as  fast  toward  evening,  and  was 
massed  in  heavy  drifts  during  the  night.  In  the  upper 
town,  at  the  end  of  the  Street  of  the  Goldsmiths, 
bounded  by  the  north  face  of  the  cathedral  transept, 
the  snow,  driven  by  the  wind,  was  engulfed,  and  beaten 
against  the  door  of  St,  Agnes,  that  antique,  half  Gothic 
portal,  rich  with  sculptures  under  the  bareness  of  the 
gable.  At  dawn  the  next  day  it  was  more  than  three 
feet  deep. 

The  street  still  slumbered  after  the  festivities  of  the 
night.  Six  o’clock  struck.  In  the  shadows  which 
tinged  with  blue  the  slow,  dizzying  fall  of  the  snow- 
flakes, a solitary,  irresolute  form  gave  sign  of  life,  a tiny 
nine-year-old  girl,  who  had  taken  refuge  under  the  arch- 
way of  the  entrance  and  had  passed  the  night  there 
shivering.  She  was  clad  in  tatters,  her  head  wrapped  in 
a rag  of  foulard,  her  bare  feet  thrust  into  a man’s  large 


jfMIZE  ZOLA 


465 


shoes.  She  must  have  stranded  there  after  long  wan- 
dering in  the  town,  for  she  had  fallen  from  weariness. 
The  end  of  all  things  seemed  to  have  come  for  her ; 
nothing  was  left  but  abandonment,  gnawing  hunger, 
killing  cold.  Choked  with  the  heavy  beating  of  her 
heart,  she  had  ceased  to  struggle.  There  remained 
only  the  physical  recoil,  the  instinctive  change  of  place, 
of  sinking  down  among  those  old  stones  when  a squall 
drove  the  snow  in  a whirlwind  about  her.  . . . 

Since  the  bells  had  struck  eight  and  the  day  had  ad- 
vanced, nothing  had  protected  her.  If  she  had  not  trod- 
den it  down  the  snow  would  have  reached  her  shoulders. 
The  antique  door  behind  her  was  tapestried  as  if  with 
ermine,  white  as  an  altar  at  the  foot  of  the  gray  fagade, 
so  bare  and  smooth  that  not  a flake  clung  there.  The 
great  saints  on  the  splay  above  were  robed  in  it  from 
their  feet  to  their  white  locks,  glistening  with  purity. 
Higher  still  the  scenes  on  the  ceiling,  the  lesser  saints 
in  the  vaults,  rose  in  ridges  traced  with  a line  of  white 
upon  the  sombre  background,  up  to  the  crowning  rapt- 
ure, the  marriage  of  St.  Agnes,  which  the  archangels 
seemed  to  celebrate  in  a shower  of  white  roses.  Upright 
on  her  pillar,  with  her  white  palm-branch,  her  white 
lamb,  the  statue  of  the  child  martyr  stood  in  stainless 
purity,  her  body  of  unsullied  snow,  in  a motionless  ri- 
gidity of  cold  that  froze  about  her  the  mystical  darts  of 
triumphant  virginity.  And  at  her  feet  stood  the  other, 
the  forlorn  child,  white  as  snow  like  herself,  stif- 
fened as  if  of  stone,  no  longer  distinguishable  from  the 
saints. 

And  now  the  clattering  of  a blind  thrown  back  along 
the  sleeping  house-fronts  made  her  raise  her  eyes.  It 
came  from  the  right,  at  the  first  floor  of  the  house  ad- 
joining the  cathedral.  A pretty  woman,  a brunette 
about  forty  years  old,  had  just  leaned  out,  and  despite 
the  cruel  cold,  she  paused  a moment  with  bare,  out- 
stretched arm,  as  she  saw  the  child  move.  Compas- 
sionate surprise  saddened  her  calm  face.  Then  with  a 
shiver  she  closed  the  window,  carrying  with  her  from 
that  swift  glance  under  the  shred  of  foulard,  the  vision 
of  a blond  waif  with  violet  eyes,  a long  neck  with  the 
grace  of  a lily,  falling  shoulders  ; but  blue  with  cold, 


4<$6 


J&MILE  ZOLA 


her  tiny  hands  and  feet  half-dead,  nothing  living  about 
her  but  the  light  vapor  of  her  breath. 

The  child  remained  with  upraised  eyes  fixed  on  the 
house,  a narrow  house  of  a single  story,  very  old,  built 
toward  the  close  of  the  fifteenth  century.  It  was  sealed 
so  closely  to  the  flank  of  the  cathedral  between  two 
buttresses,  that  it  looked  like  a wart  between  two  toes 
of  a colossus.  Situated  thus  it  was  admirably  protected, 
with  its  stone  base,  its  front  of  wooden  panels  decorated 
with  simulated  bricks,  its  roof  with  timbers  hanging  a 
metre  wide  over  the  gable,  its  turret  with  projecting 
staircase  at  the  left  angle,  and  narrow  window  that  still 
retained  the  lead  placed  there  of  old.  Nevertheless  age 
had  necessitated  repair.  The  covering  of  tiles  dated 
from  Louis  XIV.  It  was  easy  to  distinguish  the  work 
done  at  that  epoch  : a dormer-window  pierced  in  the 
turret,  small  wooden  sashes  replacing  everywhere  those 
of  the  primitive  large  windows,  the  three  clustered  bays 
of  the  first  floor  reduced  to  two,  the  middle  one  being 
filled  up  with  brick,  which  gave  to  the  fapade  the  sym- 
metry of  the  other  more  recent  constructions  in  the 
street.  On  the  ground  floor  the  modifications  were  as 
plainly  visible  ; a carved  oaken  door  in  place  of  the  old 
one  of  iron-work  under  the  staircase,  and  the  grand 
central  archway,  of  which  the  bottom,  the  sides,  and  the 
apex  filled  up  with  mason-work  in  such  away  as  to  leave 
only  a rectangular  opening,  a sort  of  large  window  in- 
stead of  the  pointed  arch  that  had  formerly  opened  on 
the  pavement. 

The  child,  looking  dully  at  the  master-artisan’s  ven- 
erable and  well-kept  dwelling,  saw  nailed  beside  the 
door,  at  the  left,  a yellow  sign  bearing  the  words  “ Hu- 
bert, chasuble-maker,”  in  ancient  black  letters.  Again 
the  noise  of  an  opening  shutter  caught  her  attention. 
This  time  it  was  the  shutter  of  the  square  window  on 
the  first  floor.  A man  in  his  turn  leaned  out,  with 
anxious  face,  nose  like  an  eagle’s  beak,  a rugged  fore- 
head crowned  with  thick  hair,  already  white,  though  he 
was  scarcely  forty-five  years  old ; and  he  also  paused 
for  a moment  to  look  at  her  with  a sorrowful  quiver  of 
his  large,  tender  mouth.  Then  she  saw  him  remain 
standing  behind  the  small  greenish  window-panes.  He 


EMILE  ZOLA 


467 


turned  and  beckoned  ; his  pretty  wife  reappeared,  and 
they  stood  side  by  side  motionless,  looking  steadily  at 
her  with  an  expression  of  deep  sadness.  . . . 

Troubled  by  their  gaze,  the  child  shrank  farther  be- 
hind St.  Agnes’s  pillar.  She  was  disquieted,  too,  by  the 
walking  in  the  street,  the  shops  opening,  the  people 
beginning  to  stir.  The  Street  of  the  Goldsmiths,  whose 
end  was  buttressed  against  the  lateral  wall  of  the  church, 
would  have  been  a veritable  blind  alley  stopped  up  on 
the  side  by  the  Hubert  dwelling,  if  the  Rue  Soleil,  a nar- 
row passage,  had  not  opened  on  the  other  side,  threading 
along  the  opposite  flank  to  the  grand  facade,  the  place 
of  the  Cloisters  ; and  now  there  passed  by  this  way  two 
devotees  who  cast  an  astonished  glance  on  the  little 
pauper  whom  they  did  not  know.  . . . 

But  ashamed  of  her  desolate  condition  as  of  a fault, 
the  child  drew  back  still  farther,  when  all  at  once  she 
saw  before  her  Hubertine,  who,  having  no  maid,  was 
going  out  herself  for  bread. 

“What  are  you  doing  there,  little  one?*' 

The  child  did  not  answer  ; she  hid  her  face.  But  her 
limbs  were  benumbed,  her  senses  swam  as  if  her  heart, 
turned  to  ice,  had  stood  still.  When  the  good  woman 
with  a gesture  of  pity  turned  away  she  sank  upon  her 
knees,  her  strength  all  gone,  and  slid  helplessly  down 
in  the  snow  whose  flakes  were  silently  burying  her. 
And  the  woman  coming  back  with  her  hot  bread,  saw 
her  lying  thus  upon  the  floor. 

“ Let  us  see,  little  one  ; you  cannot  be  left  under  that 
gateway,”  said  she.  Then  Hubert,  who  had  come  out 
and  was  standing  on  the  threshold  of  the  house,  took 
the  bread,  saying : “ Take  her  up  : bring  her  in.” 

Hubertine,  without  replying,  lifted  her  in  her  strong 
arms.  And  the  child  drew  back  no  more,  but  was 
carried  like  a lifeless  thing,  her  teeth  set,  her  eyes 
closed,  benumbed  with  the  cold,  light  as  a little  bird 
that  has  fallen  out  of  the  nest. — The  Dream. 

In  February,  1898,  Zola  was  fined  and  sentenced 
to  a year’s  imprisonment  for  criticising  a court- 
martial  which  found  a Jewish  officer  guilty  of  sell- 
ing French  military  secrets  to  the  German  Gov- 
ernment 


ZOROASTER,  or  Zarathushtra,  a Bactrian 
or  Persian  philosopher,  founder  of  the  Perso- 
Iranian  religion.  He  lived  in  a period  of  such 
remote  antiquity  that  he  seems  to  us  to-day  to  be 
rather  a myth  than  a real  historical  personage. 
According  to  the  Zend-Avesta,  he  lived  dur- 
ing the  reign  of  Vitacpa,  whom  some  writers 
identify  with  Hystaspes,  the  father  of  Darius  I. 
Assuming  this  to  be  approximately  true,  Zoroas- 
ter lived  between  five  and  six  hundred  years  be- 
fore Christ.  Some  writers  say  he  lived  1,500 
years  before  the  Christian  Era.  The  earliest 
Greek  writer  to  mention  him  is  Plato.  Accord- 
ing to  Aristotle  and  others,  he  lived  5,000  years 
before  Plato.  Niebuhr  regards  him  solely  as  a 
myth.  Tradition  regards  him  as  a legislator, 
prophet,  pontiff,  and  philosopher.  The  doctrines 
in  the  Zend-Avesta  are  ascribed  to  him,  and  pro- 
fess to  be  the  revelations  of  Ormuzd,  made  to  his 
servant  Zoroaster.  He  teaches  that  the  universe 
is  a constant  scene  of  conflict  between  the  good 
and  the  bad;  that  each  of  these  principles  pos- 
sesses creative  power,  but  the  good  is  eternal  and 
will  finally  triumph  over  the  bad,  which  will  then 
sink  with  all  its  followers  into  darkness,  its  native 
element.  He  also  believed  in  an  infinite  Deity 
called  Time  Without  Bounds.  The  religion  of 
Zoroaster  has  degenerated  into  an  idolatrous 
worship  of  fire  and  the  sun. 


ZOROASTER 


469 


ORMUZD  AND  AHRIMAN. 

Both  these  Heavenly  Beings,  the  Twins,  gave  first  of 
themselves  to  understand 

Both  the  good  and  the  evil  in  thoughts,  words,  and 
works  ; 

Rightly  do  the  wise  distinguish  between  them,  not  so 
the  imprudent. 

When  both  these  Heavenly  Beings  came  together,  in 
order  to  create  at  first 

Life  and  perishability,  and  as  the  world  should  be  at  last ; 

The  evil  for  the  bad,  the  Best  Spirit  for  the  pure. 

Of  these  two  Heavenly  Beings,  the  bad  chose  the  evil, 
acting  thereafter  ; 

The  Holiest  Spirit,  which  prepared  the  very  firm  heaven, 
chose  the  pure, 

And  those  who  make  Ahura  contented  with  manifest 
actions,  believing  in  Mazda. 

— Fro7n  the  Zend-Avesta,  Thirtieth  Section  of  the  Yafna. 

A PRAYER. 

I desire  by  my  prayer  with  uplifted  hand  this  joy  : 

First,  the  entirely  pure  works  of  the  Holy  Spirit,  Mazda, 

Then,  the  understanding  of  Vohu-mano,  and  that  which 
rejoices  the  soul  of  the  Bull. 

I draw  near  to  You,  O Ahura-Mazda,  with  good-mind- 
edness. 

Give  me  for  both  these  worlds,  the  corporeal  as  well  as 
the  spiritual, 

Gifts  arising  out  of  purity,  which  make  joyful  in  bright- 
ness. 

I praise  you  first,  O Asha  and  Vohu-mano, 

And  Ahura-Mazda,  to  whom  belongs  an  imperishable 
kingdom  ; 

May  Armaiti,  to  grant  gifts,  come  hither  at  my  call  ! 

— From  the  Zend-Avesta,  Twenty-eighth  Sec - 
tion  of  the  Yafna . 


ZORRILLA  Y MORAL,  Jos£,a  Spanish  poet, 
born  at  Valladolid,  February  21,  1817;  died  at 
Madrid,  January  22,  1893.  He  was  educated  at 
Toledo  and  Valladolid;  and  having  studied  law 
he  entered  the  office  of  a justice  of  the  peace  in 
his  native  city.  His  father,  himself  a noted  law- 
yer, opposed  the  son’s  choice  of  occupation ; 
whereupon  the  young  man  ran  away  to  Madrid. 
At  the  age  of  twenty  he  repeated  an  elegy  at  the 
funeral  of  the  poet  Larra,  which  was  so  well  re- 
ceived that  his  father  forgave  his  disobedience 
and  a permanent  reconciliation  was  effected.  In 
the  same  year  the  young  poet  issued  his  first  col 
lection  of  verse.  He  left  Spain  in  1845,  and  after 
a stay  in  Brussels  and  another  in  Paris,  he  went  to 
Mexico,  where,  in  1853,  he  was  made  director  of 
the  theatre,  for  which  he  wrote  a number  of  com- 
edies that  were  well  received  throughout  the 
country.  He  next  found  employment  in  the  house- 
hold of  the  Emperor  Maximilian,  in  whose  praise 
he  wrote  adulatory  verses  which  made  their  author 
so  unpopular  with  the  patriots  of  Mexico  that  in 
1865  he  departed  finally  for  his  native  land.  His 
published  works  include  Cantos  del  Travador 
(1841)  ; Flores  Perdidas  (1843)  > El  Zapatero  y el  Rey 
U844);  his  best  comedy,  Granada  { 1853);  his  best 
poem,  Poema  Religioso  ( 1 869) ; and  Album  de  un  Loco 
(1877).  Several  collections  of  the  works  ot  Zor. 
, 


471 


JOSE  MORAL  Y ZORRILLA 

rilla  have  been  published  in  Madrid  and  in  Paris. 
He  was  crowned  poet  in  the  Alhambra  in  1889. 

Larousse  speaks  of  him  as  “ the  most  celebrated 
and  at  the  same  time  the  most  popular  of  the 
Spanish  poets  of  our  time.” 

THE  CATHEDRAL  OF  TOLEDO. 

This  massive  form,  sculptured  in  mountain  stones, 

As  it  once  issued  from  the  earth  profound, 
Monstrous  in  stature,  manifold  in  tones 
Of  incense,  light,  and  music  spread  around. 

This  an  unquiet  people  still  doth  throng, 

With  pious  steps,  and  heads  bent  down  in  fear,— 
Yet  not  so  noble  as  through  ages  long, 

Is  old  Toledo’s  sanctuary  austere. 

Glorious  in  other  days,  it  stands  alone, 

Mourning  the  worship  of  more  Christian  years, 
Like  to  a fallen  queen,  her  empire  gone, 

Wearing  a crown  of  miseries  and  tears. 

Or  like  a mother,  hiding  griefs  unseen, 

She  calls  her  children  to  her  festivals, 

And  triumphs  still — despairing,  yet  serene — 

With  swelling  organs  and  with  pealing  bells. 

Through  the  long  nave  is  heard  the  measured  tread 
Of  the  old  priest,  who  early  matins  keeps, 

His  sacred  robe,  in  rustling  folds  outspread, 

Over  the  echoing  pavement  sweeps — 

A sound  awaking,  like  a trembling  breath 
Of  earnest  yet  unconscious  prayer, 

Uprising  from  thick  sepulchres  beneath, 

A voice  from  Christian  sleepers  there. 

Upon  the  altars  burns  the  holy  fire, 

The  censers  swing  on  grating  chains  of  gold, 

And  from  the  farther  depths  of  the  dark  choir 
Chants  in  sublimest  echoings  are  rolled. 


472 


JOSE  MORAL  Y ZORRILLA 

The  people  come  in  crowds,  and,  bending  lowly, 
Thank  their  great  Maker  for  his  mercies  given  ; 
Then  raise  their  brows,  flushed  with  emotion  holy — 
About  them  beams  the  light  of  opening  heaven. 

The  priest  repeats  full  many  a solemn  word, 

Made  sacred  to  devotion  through  all  time  ; 

The  people  kneel  again,  as  each  is  heard, 

Each  cometh  fraught  with  memories  sublime. 

The  organ,  from  its  golden  trumpets  blowing. 

Swells  with  their  robust  voices  through  the  aisles. 
As  from  a mountain-fall  wild  waters  flowing, 

Roll  in  sonorous  waves  and  rippling  smiles. 


ZSCHOKKE,  Johann  Heinrich  Daniel,  a 
German -Swiss  historian  and  novelist,  born  at 
Magdeburg,  Prussia,  March  22,  1771  ; died  at 
Biberach,  near  Aarau,  Switzerland,  June  27, 
1848.  At  seventeen  he  ran  away  from  school  and 
joined  a company  of  strolling  players,  with  whom 
he  remained  for  some  years.  Afterward  he  en- 
tered the  University  of  Frankfort-on-the-Oder, 
where  in  1792  he  became  a tutor,  and  in  1793 
wrote  the  romance  Abdllhio , the  Great  Bandit , 
which  he  also  dramatized.  In  both  forms  it  was 
very  popular  in  its  time.  In  1795  he  applied  for 
a regular  professorship  at  Frankfort,  but  this  was 
refused  on  account  of  something  which  he  had 
written  against  the  edict  of  the  Prussian  Govern- 
ment in  respect  to  religion.  He  thereupon  took 
up  his  residence  in  Switzerland,  where  he  became 
a citizen,  opened  a successful  private  school,  and 
during  many  years  held  important  civic  positions, 
through  all  the  mutations  of  the  time.  In  1828 
he  published  an  edition  of  his  Select  Works  in 
forty  volumes,  to  which  many  more  were  subse- 
quently added.  He  wrote  numerous  tales,  many 
of  which  have  been  translated  into  English,  and 
some  of  them — as  The  Journal  of  a Poor  Vicar  and 
The  Goldmaker  s Village — have  become  classics  in 
our  language.  Among  his  historical  works  is 
The  History  of  Switzerland , which  has  been  trans- 
lated by  Francis  G.  Shaw,  of  Boston.  He  also 


~ m JOHANN  HEINRICH  DANIEL  ZSCHOKKE 

put  forth  a very  readable  Autobiography.  His 
Hours  of  Devotion  originally  appeared  in  weekly 
fly-leaves  during  eight  years  (1809-16).  He 
afterward  made  a revised  selection  of  these 
papers,  with  a characteristic  preface,  in  one  large 
volume,  which  has  been  translated  by  Mr.  Bur- 
rows. The  Hours  of  Devotion  was  a great  favorite 
of  Queen  Victoria,  and  soon  after  the  death  of 
Prince  Albert  a portion  of  it  was  newly  trans- 
lated, and  sumptuously  published  under  her  aus- 
pices under  the  title,  Meditations  on  Death. 

WILLIAM  TELL  AND  GESSLER. 

The  Bailiff,  Hermann  Gessler,  was  not  easy  ; because 
he  had  an  evil  conscience  it  seemed  to  him  that  the 
people  began  to  raise  their  heads,  and  to  show  more  and 
more  boldness.  Therefore  he  set  the  ducal  hat  of  Aus- 
tria upon  a pole  in  Uri, and  ordered  that  everyone  who 
passed  before  it  should  do  it  reverence.  By  this  means 
he  wished  to  discover  who  was  opposed  to  Austria. 
And  William  Tell,  the  archer  of  Burglen,  one  of  the 
men  of  Riitli,  passed  before  it,  but  he  did  not  bow.  He 
was  immediately  carried  to  the  Bailiff,  who  angrily  said  : 
“Insolent  archer,  I will  punish  thee  by  means  of 
thine  own  craft.  I will  place  an  apple  on  the  head  of 
thy  little  son  ; shoot  it  off,  and  fail  not.” 

And  they  bound  the  child,  and  placed  an  apple  on 
his  head,  and  led  the  archer  far  away.  He  took  aim — 
the  bow-string  twanged,  the  arrow  pierced  the  apple. 
All  the  people  shouted  for  joy  ; but  Gessler  said  to  the 
archer  : “Why  didst  thou  take  a second  arrow  ?”  Tell 
answered  : “ If  the  first  had  not  pierced  the  apple,  the 
second  would  assuredly  have  pierced  thy  heart.” 

This  terrified  the  Bailiff,  and  he  ordered  the  archer 
to  be  seized,  and  carried  to  a boat  in  which  he  was 
himself  about  to  embark  for  Kiissnacht.  He  did  not 
think  it  prudent  to  imprison  Tell  in  Uri,  on  account  of 
the  people  ; but  to  drag  him  into  foreign  captivity  was 


JOHANN  HEINRICH  DANIEL  ZSCHOKKE  475 


contrary  to  the  privileges  of  the  country.  Therefore 
the  Bailiff  feared  an  assembling  of  the  people,  and  has- 
tily departed,  in  spite  of  a strong  head-wind.  The  sea 
rose  and  the  waves  dashed  foaming  over  the  boat,  so 
that  all  were  alarmed  and  the  boatmen  disheartened. 
The  farther  they  went  on  the  lake  the  greater  was  the 
danger  of  death  ; for  the  steep  mountains  rose  from  the 
abyss  of  waters,  like  walls  to  the  heavens.  In  great 
anxiety  Gessler  ordered  the  fetters  to  be  removed  from 
Tell,  that  he — an  experienced  steersman — might  take 
the  helm.  But  Tell  steered  toward  the  bare  flank  of 
the  Axenberg,  where  a naked  rock  projects,  like  a small 
shell,  into  the  lake.  There  was  a shock — a spring  ; 
Tell  was  on  the  rock — the  boat  out  upon  the  lake. 

The  freed  man  climbed  the  mountains  and  fled  across 
the  land  of  Schwytz  ; and  he  thought  in  his  troubled 
heart : “Whither  can  I fly  from  the  wrath  of  the  tyrant  ? 
Even  if  I escape  from  his  pursuit,  he  has  my  wife  and 
child  in  my  house  as  hostages.  What  may  not  Gessler 
do  to  my  family,  when  Landenberg  put  out  the  eyes  of 
the  old  man  of  Melchthal  on  account  of  a servant’s 
broken  fingers  ? Where  is  the  judgment-seat  before 
which  I can  cite  Gessler,  when  the  king  himself  no  lon- 
ger listens  to  the  complaints  of  the  people  ? As  law  has 
no  authority,  and  there  is  none  to  judge  between  thee 
and  me,  thou  and  I,  Gessler,  are  both  without  law,  and 
self-preservation  is  our  only  judge.  Either  my  inno- 
cent wife  and  child,  and  Fatherland,  must  fall,  or — 
Bailiff  Gessler — thou  ! Fall  thou,  and  let  liberty  prevail.” 

So  thought  Tell ; and  with  bow  and  arrow  fled  toward 
Kiissnacht,  and  hid  in  the  hollow-way  near  the  village. 
Thither  came  the  Bailiff ; there  the  bow-string  twanged  ; 
there  the  free  arrow  pierced  the  tyrant’s  heart.  The 
whole  people  shouted  for  joy  when  they  learned  the 
death  of  the  oppressor.  Tell’s  deed  increased  their 
courage — but  the  night  of  the  New  Year  had  not  come. 
— History  of  Switzerland '. 

THE  BLOODLESS  DELIVERANCE  OF  SWITZERLAND. 

The  New  Year’s  Night  came.  One  of  the  young  men 
who  had  taken  the  oath  at  Rtitli  went  to  the  castle  of 


476  JOHANN  HEINRICH  DANIEL  ZSCHOKKE 

Rossburg  in  Oberwalden,  where  lived  a young  girl  be- 
loved by  him.  With  a rope  the  young  girl  drew  him  up 
from  the  castle-ditch  into  her  chamber.  Twenty  others 
were  waiting  below,  whom  the  first  drew  up  also.  When 
all  had  entered,  they  mastered  the  steward  and  his  ser- 
vants, and  the  whole  castle. 

When  it  was  day,  Landenberg  left  the  royal  castle 
near  Sarnen,  to  attend  mass.  Twenty  men  of  Unter- 
walden  met  him,  bearing,  as  customary  presents,  fowls, 
goats,  lambs,  and  other  New  Year’s  gifts.  The  Bailiff, 
in  a friendly  manner,  told  them  to  enter  the  castle. 
When  under  the  gate,  one  of  them  sounded  his  horn. 
At  once  all  drew  forth  sharp  spear-heads,  which  they 
fastened  upon  their  staves,  and  took  the  castle  ; while 
thirty  others  who  had  been  hidden  in  a neighboring 
thicket  came  to  their  assistance.  Landenberg  fled  ter- 
rified over  the  meadows  toward  Alpnach.  But  they 
took  him,  and  made  him  and  all  his  people  swear  to 
leave  the  Waldstatten  forever.  Then  they  permitted 
him  to  retire  to  Lucerne.  No  injury  was  done  to  any- 
one. High  blazed  the  bonfires  on  the  Alps.  With  the 
people  of  Schwytz,  Staffaucher  went  to  the  Lake  of 
Lowerz,  and  seized  the  castle  of  Schwanau.  The  people 
of  Uri  marched  out,  and  Gessler’s  tower  was  taken  by 
assault.  That  was  Freedom’s  New  Year’s  Day. 

On  the  following  Sunday,  deputies  from  the  three 
districts  assembled,  and  with  an  oath  renewed  their 
original  bond  for  ten  years  ; and  the  bond  was  to  en- 
dure forever,  and  to  be  often  renewed.  They  had  re- 
assumed their  ancient  rights,  had  shed  no  drop  of  blood, 
and  had  done  no  harm  to  any  in  the  land. — History  cj 
Switzerland. 


ZWINGLI,  Ulric  or  Huldreich,  a noted 
Swiss  reformer  and  co-laborer  with  Calvin  in  es« 
tablishing  the  Protestant  Church,  born  at  Wild- 
haus,  in  the  canton  of  St.  Gall,  Switzerland,  Jan- 
uary i,  1484;  killed  in  battle  at  Kappel,  October 
11,  1531.  His  father’s  brother  was  parish  priest 
of  Wildhaus,  and  afterward  Dean  of  Wesen  ; his 
mother  was  sister  of  the  abbot  of  a cloister  in 
Thurgau.  He  was  sent  to  school  at  Wesen  and 
Basel,  and  then  to  the  high  school  at  Berne, 
where  he  gained  his  enduring  love  for  classical 
literature.  After  two  years’  study  in  Vienna 
(1500-2)  he  returned  to  Basel,  where  from  the 
renowned  Thomas  Wyttenbach  he  imbibed  the 
evangelical  views  which  later  he  developed  and 
defended  in  the  crisis  of  the  Reformation.  At 
the  age  of  twenty-two  he  was  ordained  by  the 
Bishop  of  Constance,  and  was  appointed  to  the 
parish  of  Glarus.  Here,  by  vigorous  denunci- 
ation, he  induced  the  authorities  of  the  canton  of 
Zurich  to  abolish  the  mercenary  and  immoral 
practice  of  hiring  out  the  Swiss  troops  to  neigh- 
boring states.  Having  been  transferred  in  1516 
to  Einsedeln,  then  and  still  a resort  for  pilgrims 
to  the  image  of  the  Virgin  and  Child,  which  has 
stood  there  for  a thousand  years,  he  publicly  at- 
tacked the  practice  of  such  worshipping  pilgrim- 
ages as  superstitious,  and  declined  the  promotion 


ULRIC  Z WING LI 


478 

with  which  Rome  sought  to  buy  his  silence.  In 
1518  he  accepted  his  election  as  preacher  in  the 
cathedral  at  Zurich  on  pledge  being  given  that 
his  liberty  in  preaching  should  not  be  restricted. 
This  liberty  he  soon  proceeded  to  use  by  de- 
nouncing the  sale  of  indulgences,  and  discrediting 
fasting  and  the  celibacy  of  the  clergy.  The  stir 
which  this  caused  among  the  people  brought  in- 
terference  by  Pope  Adrian,  with  a demand  that 
the  Zurichers  should  abandon  Zwiixgli.  The  re- 
former procured  from  the  Council  of  Constance 
in  1523  permission  for  a public  disputation  of  the 
questions  involved,  at  which  the  sixty-seven  theses 
which  he  maintained  against  Rome  were  upheld 
by  the  Council.  The  result  was  the  legal  estab- 
lishment of  the  Reformation  in  that  canton. 

In  January,  1528,  a public  disputation  to  which 
Zwingli  had  challenged  the  Roman  Catholics  of 
Berne  was  held  in  that  citjr ; and  so  vigorous 
was  the  presentation  of  the  Protestant  cause  that 
the  Bernese  acceded  to  the  Reformation.  But,  in 
the  subsequent  management  of  cantonal  relations 
by  the  Protestant  authorities  of  Zurich,  Zwingli’s 
earnest  advice  was  disregarded  ; a religious  truce 
was  patched  up  with  guaranties  of  toleration 
which  never  were  observed  in  the  Roman  Catho- 
lic cantons.  These  cantons,  indeed,  prepared  se- 
cretly for  war,  and  in  1531  marched  suddenly  on 
Zurich,  whose  troops,  hastily  gathered,  and  largely 
outnumbered  in  the  conflict  at  Kappel,  were  de- 
feated. Zwingli,  present  as  chaplain,  was  wounded 
by  a lance  while  stooping  to  a dying  soldier,  and,  it 
is  said,  was  killed,  unrecognized  except  as  a heretic. 


VLRIC  Z WING  LI 


as  he  fay  on  the  field  after  the  battle.  The  vic- 
tors, discovering  who  he  was,  burned  his  body 
and  scattered  his  ashes  to  the  winds.  The  spot  ot 
his  death  was  marked  in  1838  by  a great  granite 
bowlder  roughly  squared. 

Zwingli’s  views  are  fully  expressed  in  the  First 
Helvetic  Confession  (1536).  They  present  the  Re- 
formed, or  the  extreme  Protestant,  as  distinguished 
from  the  Lutheran  doctrine — being  more  uncom- 
promising in  ascribing  to  Holy  Scripture  supreme 
authority  over  all  traditions  and  all  Church  order- 
ings, and  more  thorough  in  demanding  that  re- 
form should  be  carried  through  all  government 
and  discipline  as  well  as  theology.  Zwingli  gave 
a full  development  to  the  general  tendency  of  his 
times  to  identify  the  government  of  the  Church 
with  that  of  the  State.  In  nearly  all  other  re- 
spects his  views  were  surprisingly  in  advance  of 
his  century,  and  had  much  in  common  with  those 
held  by  the  liberal  evangelical  churches  of  the 
present  day.  His  chief  difference  with  Luther — 
and  one  which  unfortunately  called  forth  Luther’s 
bitter  antagonism — was  on  the  theory  of  the  Lord’s 
Supper,  which  observance  he  reduced  from  a mys- 
terious sacrament  to  an  ordinance  of  Christ  for 
the  simple  commemoration  in  faith  of  the  atoning 
sacrifice.  He  denied  that  in  any  real  and  proper 
sense  the  body  and  blood  of  Christ  are  present  in 
the  bread  and  the  wine ; yet  with  his  idea  of 
“faith”  as  not  merely  a belief  in  doctrines  about 
Christ,  but  as  chiefly  a loving  trust  in  Christ  as  a 
living  Person,  he  gained  a certain  “ real  presence  ” 
of  the  living  Lord  at  the  chief  commemorative 


480 


ULRIC  Z WING  LI 


Christian  observance.  Zwingli’s  view  Is  probably 
advancing  now  in  more  than  one  denomination  ; 
but  it  seems  to  have  failed  to  maintain  itself  fully 
in  Switzerland  after  his  death — the  view  of  Calvin 
having  gained  wider  adherence  among  the  Re- 
formed churches. 

Zwingli’s  writings  do  not  show  Calvin’s  pene- 
trating and  iron  logic,  nor  Luther’s  mighty  and 
passionate  sweep.  But  they  give  forcible  and  di- 
rect expression  of  an  absolutely  sincere  and  fear- 
less spirit  awaking  in  what  was,  to  him,  the  morn- 
ing light  of  an  evangelical  faith. 

Among  his  works  are  Of  the  True  and  False 
Religion  (1525);  The  Providence  of  God  (1530);  A 
Brief  Exposition  of  the  Christian  Faith  (1531);  The 
First  Helvetic  Confession  (compiled  1536);  The 
Last  Supper  of  Christ , On  Baptism , and  a treatise 
on  Education. 

EDUCATION  AND  PUBLIC  LIFE  FROM  A SCRIPTURAL 
POINT  OF  VIEW. 

The  moral  nature  of  the  youth  having  been  strength- 
ened by  faith,  the  next  in  order  is  to  discipline  his  mind, 
that  he  may  be  of  help  and  use  to  his  fellow-men.  This 
can  be  best  done  if  he  acquaint  himself  with  the  Word 
of  God.  However,  for  a thorough  understanding  of  the 
Scriptures  a mastery  of  Hebrew  and  Greek  is  necessary  ; 
for  without  a knowledge  of  these  languages  neither  the 
Old  nor  the  New  Testament  can  be  clearly  understood. 
But  since  the  Latin  language  is  in  universal  use,  it  must 
not  be  neglected  ; for,  although  it  is  of  less  service  than 
Hebrew  and  Greek  in  the  understanding  of  the  Script- 
ures, it  is  of  great  importance  in  public  life.  There 
are  also  occasions  where  we  are  obliged  to  defend  the 
cause  of  Christ  among  those  speaking  Latin.  However, 
a Christian  should  not  degrade  these  languages  for  the 


ULRIC  ZWINGLI 


481 


purpose  of  acquiring  earthly  gain  or  for  pure  intellect- 
ual  enjoyment ; for  language  is  a gift  of  the  Holy  Spirit. 

As  indicated  above,  the  language  to  be  studied  next 
to  Latin  is  Greek,  principally  for  the  sake  of  a thorough 
grounding  in  the  New  Testament ; for  it  seems  to  me 
that  the  doctrines  of  Christ  have  not  been  treated  so 
carefully  and  thoroughly  by  the  Latin  as  by  the  Greek 
fathers.  Hence  the  youthful  student  is  to  be  taken  to 
the  fountain-head.  But  in  acquiring  Latin  and  Greek, 
one  must  fortify  himself  through  faith  and  innocence  ; 
for  many  things  are  contained  in  the  literature  of  these 
languages  which  are  apt  to  be  hurtful  ; as  for  example, 
petulance,  ambition,  a warlike  spirit,  useless  knowledge, 
vain  wisdom,  and  the  like.  Nevertheless,  like  Ulysses  of 
old,  the  youthful  student,  if  forewarned,  can  pass  by  all 
these  tempting  powers  unscathed,  if,  at  the  first  siren 
sound,  he  call  out  to  himself,  in  warning  tones  : “ Thou 
hearest  this  that  thou  mayest  flee,  that  thou  canst  be  on 
thy  guard,  and  not  that  thou  mayest  indulge  thyself.” 

I have  placed  Hebrew  last  because  Latin  is  now  every- 
where in  use,  and  Greek  would  naturally  follow  it.  Oth- 
erwise I should  have  assigned  the  first  place  to  He- 
brew, for  the  reason  that  he  who  is  not  acquainted 
with  its  idiomatic  peculiarities  will,  in  many  instances, 
have  difficulty  in  ascertaining  the  true  meaning  of  the 
Greek  text. 

With  such  mental  furnishings  every  youthful  student 
is  to  be  provided  who  would  possess  himself  of  that 
heavenly  wisdom  with  which  no  earthly  knowledge  can 
be  compared.  But  with  it  he  must  combine  an  humble, 
though  aspiring,  state  of  mind.  He  will  then  find 
models  for  a righteous  life,  especially  Christ,  the  most 
perfect  and  complete  pattern  of  all  virtues.  When  he 
has  become  fully  acquainted  with  Christ  as  He  presents 
Himself  in  His  teachings  and  deeds,  he  will  become  so 
thoroughly  imbued  with  Him  that  he  will  endeavor  to 
exhibit  His  virtues  in  all  his  work,  plans,  and  actions  ; 
at  least,  as  far  as  it  is  possible  for  human  weakness  to  do. 
From  Christ  he  will  also  learn  to  speak  and  to  be  silent 
at  the  proper  times.  He  will  be  ashamed  in  his  young- 
er years  to  speak  of  things  which  pertain  to  the  expe- 
rience of  age,  seeing  that  even  Christ  did  not  dispute 


4&2 


ULRIC  Z WING  LI 


until  He  was  thirty  years  old,  although  in  His  twelfth 
year  He  gave  proof  of  the  powers  of  His  mind  before 
the  scribes.  By  this  we  are  taught  not  to  appear  in 
public  at  too  early  an  age,  but  rather  to  think  about 
great  and  godly  things  while  young,  and  thus  to  ac- 
quaint ourselves  with  them. 

Shall  I warn  a Christian  youth  against  avarice  and 
ambition,  when  these  vices  were  considered  despicable 
even  among  the  ancient  heathens?  Whoever  is  given 
to  avarice  will  not  become  a Christian  ; for  this  vice  has 
not  only  ruined  individuals,  but  has  also  annihilated 
flourishing  empires,  demolished  powerful  cities,  and 
destroyed  every  republic  that  has  been  infected  by  it. 
Whenever  it  overpowers  a human  being,  it  stifles  every 
noble  aspiration.  Avarice  is  a fatal  poison,  which  is 
spreading  rapidly  and  has  become  one  of  our  powerful 
adversaries.  Yet  through  Christ  we  are  enabled  to  over- 
come it  if  we  are  His  earnest  followers  ; for  He  Himself 
has  battled  with  and  overcome  this  vice. 

I will  not  speak  against  fencing,  although  I think 
that  it  behooves  a Christian  to  abstain  from  the  use  of 
arms  as  far  as  is  compatible  with  public  peace  and 
safety.  For  God,  who  crowned  David  with  victory  when 
he  met  Goliath  with  no  other  weapon  than  a sling,  and 
who  protected  the  defenceless  Israelites  against  the 
pursuing  enemy,  will  also  keep  and  protect  us  ; or,  if 
He  sees  fit  to  do  so,  Fie  can  strengthen  our  hands  and 
fit  us  for  the  strife.  Hence,  if  the  youth  would  practise 
fencing,  let  it  be  for  the  purpose  of  defending  his  native 
country  and  protecting  his  own  kin. 

Finally,  I would  that  all  youth,  especially  those  that 
are  intended  for  holy  orders,  might  think  as  the  inhabi- 
tants of  ancient  Massilia  did,  who  admitted  only  those  to 
citizenship  that  had  learned  a trade,  by  means  of  which 
they  were  able  to  provide  for  their  own  necessities.  If 
this  rule  were  enforced  among  us,  idleness,  the  cause 
of  all  wantonness,  would  soon  be  eradicated  from  our 
midst,  and  our  bodies  would  become  much  healthier  and 
stronger. — Education  ; translation  of  V ictor  Wilker  ex- 
pressly for  The  Library  of  Universal  Literature. 


b 


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